Time History Analysis With Recorded Accelerograms
Time History Analysis With Recorded Accelerograms
Time History Analysis With Recorded Accelerograms
A step-by-step guide for BEng/MEng/MSc students familiarizing with this piece of software
List of Content Download recorded accelerograms from the PEER database Upload a selected accelerogram to SAP2000 Run the time-history analysis and display the results
Step #1
By right-clicking on the appropriate record (NGA0006 in our case), a new page is shown with all the relevant pieces of information about this seismic event
If we scroll down, the links to the three components of the accelerogram (180, 270 and vertical) appear
The first four lines contain general pieces of information about the record, namely:
Location: Imperial Valley Date: 19th May 1940 Time: 4:39am Station: El Centro Array #9 Direction: Horizontal, 180 Units of acceleration: g= 9.81 m/s2 (acceleration of gravity) Number of time instants: 4,000 Sampling time: t= 0.01 s (f= 100 Hz)
Step #2
Define the accelerogram in SAP2000 In order to be used in a seismic simulation, the waveform previously defined must be properly assigned to an ANALYSIS CASE
Step #3
It is worth mentioning that these blue diagrams are the ENVELOPE of the corresponding outputs:
Indeed, in a dynamic analysis we have a value of the structural quantities of interest (e.g. N and M) for each time steps As engineers, we are generally interested in both minimum and maximum value, i.e. by the envelope of these responses
Display the results In order to show the time history of a given structural response, e.g. The horizontal displacement of the top floor, you mus SELECT from the menu bar: DISPLAY SHOW PLOT FUNCTIONS...