Earthquake Resistant Structural Walls - Coupled Wall Tests

摘要

In the development of earthquake resistant, reinforced concrete walls, two one-third scale, six-story coupled wall specimens were tested under incremental cyclic loadings. A lightly coupled system which damaged early was first tested and then retested with the damaged coupling beams replaced by stiffer and stronger beams. The heavy coupling beams between walls caused the system to behave as a single isolated wall, and the coupling beams yielded immediately before and after the yielding of the walls. An analytical model was developed to simulate experimental results and was used to calculate the load versus deflection relationship of the coupled wall system. Using this model, inelastic shear action in the walls was found to be a significant factor in the analysis of a lightly coupled system. In heavily coupled systems, use of the model indicated that redistribution of shear and moment between walls was significant, and that interaction of axial and flexural forces is the most important factor to consider in calculating behavior of heavily coupled systems.