Earthquake Design of Reinforced Concrete Moment Frame Using Multiple Phase Linear Analysis

Elastic analysis and design which is currently popular in practice may not assure the safety of structures subjected to inelastic deformation by earthquake. In the present study, an inelastic design method for reinforced concrete moment frames was developed. A series of linear analyses is performed for multiple earthquake load increments. In each analysis stage, the plastic mechanism which the engineer intends to develop is directly addressed. The final design strength and deformation of each member are determined as the sum of the results from the multiple linear analyses. The proposed method was applied to a 3-bay 12-story moment frame. The design result was verified by the comparison with the result of conventional nonlinear analysis on the structure. The proposed method can be conveniently used in design practice because linear analysis is used. Earthquake design strategy, such as the concept of strong column - weak beam, can be directly addressed in the proposed method by using the plastic mechanism that the engineer intends to develop