A THREE-DIMENSIONAL NONLINEAR SEISMIC ANALYSIS OF FRAMES CONSIDERING PANEL ZONE DEFORMATIONS

In the conventional studies on the seismic behavior of bridge piers, it is common to use an in-plane modeling where the real behavior of frames subjected to the three-dimensional seismic loading is ignored. Herein, we present a three-dimensional nonlinear dynamic analysis for frames, where the panel zone deformation is also considered. In this analysis, geometrical nonlinearity is precisely taken into account by using the co-rotational method, whilst the member plastification is analyzed by the plastic-zone method. With the numerical method, the three-dimensional seismic behavior is examined for bridge piers of single post-type and portal frame-type in which effect of panel-zone deformation is also discussed.