Seismic analysis of multistorey building with floating column

Abstract

In present scenario buildings with floating column is a typical feature in the modern multistory construction in urban India. Such features are highly undesirable in building built in seismically active areas. This study highlights the importance of explicitly recognizing the presence of the floating column in the analysis of building. Alternate measures, involving stiffness balance of the first storey and the storey above, are proposed to reduce the irregularity introduced by the floating columns.
FEM codes are developed for 2D multi storey frames with and without floating column to study the responses of the structure under different earthquake excitation having different frequency content keeping the PGA and time duration factor constant. The time history of floor displacement, inter storey drift, base shear, overturning moment are computed for both the frames with and without floating column.