Evaluation of plan configuration irregularity effects on seismic response demands of L-shaped MRF buildings

Damage assessments after past earthquakes have frequently revealed that plan configuration irregular buildings have more severe damage due to excessive torsional responses and stress concentration than regular buildings. The plan configuration irregularities introduce major challenges in the seismic design of buildings. One such form of irregularity is the presence of re-entrant corners in the L-shaped buildings that causes stress concentration due to sudden changes in stiffness and torsional response amplification; hence causes early collapse. A constructive research into re-entrant corner and torsional irregularity problems is essentially needed greater than ever. Therefore, the focus of this study is to investigate structural seismic response demands for the class of L-shaped buildings through evaluating the plan configuration irregularity of re-entrant corners and lateral–torsion coupling effects on measured seismic response demands. The measured responses include story drift, inter-story drift, story shear force, overturning moment, torsion moment at the base and over building height, and torsional irregularity ratio. Three dimensional finite element model for nine stories symmetric buildings as reference model is developed. In addition, six L-shaped building models are formulated with gradual reduction in the plan of the reference building model. The results prove that building models with high irregularity are more vulnerable due to the stress concentration and lateral torsional coupling behavior than that with regular buildings. In addition, the related lateral shear forces in vertical resisting elements located on the periphery of the L-shaped buildings could be significantly increased in comparison with the corresponding values for a symmetric building.