Study of Impact between Adjacent Structures during of Earthquake and their Effective Parameters

Abstract

In this research, buildings with 2-15 stories and different heights were put together using GAP joint element and nonlinear time-history analyses were done for Tabas, Elcentro and Sakaria accelerographs. The responses of both impact and non-impact cases were compared. With results analyzing, we found out that the impact increased the responses in taller buildings but decreased them in shorter ones. The largest increase was occurred when the height difference was 3 stories. Then the effective parameters in impact phenomenon, hardness and the distance between the structures were studied. The results shown that existence of the distance and hardening the structures (esp. in taller ones) may result to decrease the effect of impact in the structure responses.