In current practice, many approaches for overall building analysis focus primarily on elastic, or linearized responses. However, the earthquake response of low-rise shear wall buildings with flexible diaphragms can be highly three-dimensional, and the performance of individual components of the buildings can depend heavily on the inelastic system behavior. Key modes of response can include both in-plane and out-of-plane wall deformations, and flexural and shear diaphragm deformations. Flexible diaphragms can significantly influence the out-of-plane wall displacements. The distribution of lateral loads to the structural walls and the degree of torsional coupling between the wall systems can be strongly dependent on the flexibility of the diaphragms and the inelastic system behavior. This paper presents a reasonably accurate three-dimensional nonlinear time history analysis model for low-rise shear wall building structures. The number of degrees of freedom in the model is kept small for efficiency in rapid evaluation of physical buildings or test designs, as well as in conducting large numbers of analyses in simulation studies.
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