Pushover Analysis of a Two-Span Multicolumn Bent RC Bridge, Experimentally Tested on Three Shake Tables

Abstract eng:
A large scale model of two-span two-column bent RC bridge, representing one frame of a continuous bridge typical for the US practice was experimentally tested on three parallel shake tables at the UNR in the frame of the NEES project “Seismic Performance of Bridge Systems with Conventional and Innovative Materials”, coordinated by Prof. M. Saiidi. Although the bridge seems to be slightly irregular, its response was quite complex. The intensity as well as the direction of the deck rotations was significantly varying depending on the seismic intensity. At the ULJ, the investigated bridge was numerically analysed using the three typical pushover methods: a) the standard single mode N2 method, b) the non-adaptive multimode MPA method, and c) the adaptive multimode IRSA method. For lower seismic intensity levels, all methods estimated the displacement shape of the deck very well. For higher seismic intensity the single-mode method was less accurate. The estimation of the response made by the MPA was quantitatively relatively good, but the qualitative differences with the experiment were observed. Actual response was mostly influenced by one predominant mode, which varied the shape. In the MPA, the higher mode coincidentally compensated these changes. They were successfully identified by the IRSA method, where the estimation of the deflection shape of the superstructure was good. A poorer match with the experiment was observed only for the largest seismic intensity considered in the analytical studies. This discrepancy was mainly caused by the varying ratio of the bent stiffnesses after their yielding.

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