Modeling of Inelastic Rocking Bodies under Cyclic Loading

Abstract

The use of rocking members in earthquake-resistant structural systems has gained attention in recent years due to their inherent benefits, including the limitation of damage, recentering capabilities, and reduction of seismic forces transmitted to the rest of the structure. In this paper, the ideas behind the elastic macroelement formulation proposed by the authors in previous works, able to account for the deformability of the member along its height and across its base, are extended in order to predict the planar cyclic response of inelastic rocking members. To this end, the rocking interface is discretized and a nonlinear compression-only stress distribution is determined so that the sum of the induced elastic member displacements, calculated using the provided solutions based on the theory of elasticity, and the plastic ones induced in inelastic regions, agrees with the target displacements. Characteristic example cases are presented, and the results produced by the proposed macroelement are compared with experimental ones, showing that the form of the response of various rocking member configurations found in the literature can be adequately captured.