Seismic Evaluation of Reinforced Concrete Frames Using Forced-Based and Energy-Based Methods

One of the novel methods for design of civil engineering structures is energy based design approach. In this method, by determining the input energy and balancing between the accomplished works by the members of structures under a pre-determined mechanism, the base shear is calculated, and structures are re-designed. From the beginning of the design, selection of the appropriate mechanism and determining the target drift are the main advantages of this approach. Furthermore, compared with forced-based design method, removing the undesirable mechanisms is the superiority of this method. In this paper, reinforced concrete frames have been designed using Iranian concrete code (ABA) and energy method (weak beam-strong column). The main difference between two approaches is the calculation of base shear of structures. Unlike the force-based method, energy method does not directly use the force reduction factor (R). In this research, 4, 7 and 12-story special reinforced concrete frames have been designed using force-based and energy-based methods, and then for seismic evaluation of the frames; nonlinear static and dynamic analyses have been conducted. The results show that for designed structures using energy method, the relative displacements of the stories are uniform, and the plastic hinges have been appeared in the beams. For frames designed by energy method, whole structural capacities are participated in the earthquake energy dissipation process.