Journal
EARTHQUAKE SPECTRA
Volume 27, Issue 3, Pages 835-856Publisher
EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH INST
DOI: 10.1193/1.3609868
Keywords
building standards; construction industry; earthquake engineering; structural engineering; testing
Categories
Funding
- National Science Foundation [CMS-0429331]
- MCEER [EEC-9701471]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Building codes and standards now require seismic qualification of mechanical and electrical equipment and their mounting systems in important buildings to ensure that they remain functional during and after major seismic events. To better understand the seismic behavior of nonstructural building contents and equipment, experimental procedures have been proposed for either displacement or acceleration sensitive nonstructural components, through racking or shake table protocols, respectively. However, certain types of nonstructural systems are sensitive to both accelerations and interstory drifts. An innovative testing protocol is proposed that can subject nonstructural systems to the combined accelerations and interstory drifts expected within multistory buildings during seismic shaking. Moreover, the proposed protocol, when used with equipment such as the University at Buffalo Nonstructural Component Simulator (UB-NCS), allows for the assessment of the seismic performance of distributed nonstructural systems with multiple attachment points, and the evaluation of seismic interactions between components. The versatility and capabilities of the testing protocol are demonstrated through testing of a full-scale hospital emergency room containing typical nonstructural components and life support medical equipment. [DOI: 10.1193/1.3609868]
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available