Effect of construction quality variability on seismic fragility of reinforced concrete building

This paper highlights developing a probabilistic seismic demand model (PSDM) for reinforced concrete (RC) frames. A six-storey three-bay moment resisting RC frame is designed to a 1984 Canadian building design code. The RC frame is further modified to investigate variability of construction quality (CQ) on the PSDM. Three levels of CQ are considered, poor, average, and good. Forty five ground motion records were used to study the ground motion variability. The numerical model of the frame was developed in OpenSees and nonlinear dynamic analyses were performed, and the maximum interstorey drift is obtained as a response parameter for all simulations. The PSDM parameters are calculated using cloud analysis for all combination of construction quality. The variation in the PSDM parameters is studied. Finally, the effects of CQ on the seismic fragilities are discussed