A STOCHASTIC APPROACH FOR POUNDING EFFECTS ON THE SEISMIC RESPONSE UNDER UNCERTAINTY OF ADJACENT STRUCTURES STRENGTHENED BY CABLE-TIES

A BSTRACT : The Civil Engineering structural mechanics praxis includes framed buildings of reinforced concrete (RC). The present study deals with a stochastic numerical treatment for the pounding problem concerning the seismic interaction between adjacent RC framed structures strengthened by cable-ties when the input parameters are uncertain-but-bounded. This problem concerns here the unilateral contact between neighbouring RC structures during earthquakes and is considered as an inequality problem of dynamic structural contact mechanics. The Monte Carlo method is used for treating the uncertainty concerning input parameters. The purpose here is to estimate numerically and to control actively the influence of the cable-ties on the seismic response of the adjacent structures. Finally, in a practical case of two seismically interacting framed RC structures, the effectiveness of the proposed methodology is shown.