Model Shake Table Tests of Piled Pier Under Loading Following Seismic Deformation

Abstract eng:
Ports are required to play the important role of a base for the transportation of emergency supplies following large earthquakes. However, it is difficult to prevent deformations of all port structures during possible future massive earthquakes, and even port facilities with some damage might be required to be serviceable. Understanding the performance of port structures after seismic deformation is vital to evaluate their serviceability. Significant seismic damage can cause piled piers to collapse during handling passengers and cargo after earthquakes. In this study, we focused on a piled pier with sheet pile type backward seawall as a port mooring structure. Using a piled pier modeled at a scale of 1/40, which corresponds to a water depth of 12 m in the prototype scale, a series of shake table tests were conducted to reveal its dynamic behavior during earthquakes and performance after earthquakes. The bending stiffness of model piles is usually adjusted considering similitude law in shake table tests under the gravitational field. However, to particularly focus on the strength of the entire piled pier after deformation and not the vibration property, the model piles was made so that their bending strength corresponds to the value under the model scale considering the similarity ratio. An upper load on the concrete deck and traction force by a ship were applied to the model piled pier after earthquake motion excitation. The residual displacement and pile bending deformation of the piled pier increased with repetition of seismic excitations and placing of the upper load and ship traction load. The model piled pier collapsed when the rotation fixing at the pile heads was released assuming breakage of them. In the case of no-release of the rotation fixing, the model piled pier did not collapse although pile bending deformation exceeded all plastic bending curvature values.

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