ABOUT THE PROJECT
PROJECT TITLE: DEVELOPMENT OF PERFORMANCE BASED DESIGN AND EVALUATION METHODS BY COMPARISON WITH OBSERVED EARTHQUAKE PERFORMANCE OF THE STRUCTURES IN TURKEY
SUMMARY
During the last decade, Performance Based Design has become a newly developed concept in Earthquake Engineering. Currently, with Turkish Earthquake Design Code 2007, it has been initiated to use in seismic evaluation and retrofit of existing buildings. In the near future, when new generation seismic codes are declared, this method will be the only tool for the design of new structures. Currently, performance based design tools suffer from a major drawback in that the seismic behavior is restricted with a single mode response. Therefore such methods can be reliably applied only to the two-dimensional response of low-rise, regular buildings. One of the prime objectives of this project is to contribute for some aspects to the Turkish Earthquake Design Code, which is published in March 6th, 2007 and other earthquake codes like FEMA 386, Eurocode 8, etc. The Turkish Earthquake Code comprises the performance based evaluation of existing building in Chapter 7. The contribution is supplied by investigating the damageability of structures during the August 17th, 1999 Marmara Earthquake, using the Performance Based Design Methods. One another objectives of this project is to estimate local site effects and to compute the soil amplification as a function of frequency. Because, to verify the performance of structure under a given earthquake, site dependent spectra is required. The site investigations, experimental studies, computer simulations and damage investigations of existing structures will be employed in order to reach the project targets, Experimental studies will include determination of structural dynamic characteristics by superstructure Instrumentation, by opening deep boreholes and by geotechnical laboratory experiments. The site investigations and laboratory studies will take about one year. The obtained from these studies will be used in computer simulations. This task will last about in 8 months The project subject has a priority task defined by TÜBİTAK. These achievements will make a positive contribution for the ongoing efforts in reducing the social and economic impacts of earthquake disaster in Turkey The project team is constituted of the project executer, three assistant researchers, two project advisors and MSc. & Ph.D. students. It is proposed that the project has been completed in 30 months with the budget of 290,000YTL.