Dynamic response characteristics of ceilings on shaking table test

Abstract

In moderate seismic site, when earthquake occurs, nonstructural components may be damaged without the loss of structure. Seismic damage of nonstructural components can cause significant loss property and function in important buildings such as hospital and bank.

The failure of suspended ceiling is one of the most widely reported types of nonstructural damage in building structures. Suspended ceilings have been vulnerable to damage from earthquake, sustaining panel loss and grid failure in moderate earthquake, even in absence of major structural damage. Also, the seismic damage of suspended ceilings gives the largest contribution to the economic loss and function loss to prohibit the building from remaining operational after an earthquake. In some cases, it may endanger the life or safety of its occupants.

For these reasons, seismic design for suspended ceiling is needed. Though the study of the Korean suspended ceilings was barely performed, it is hard to understand the seismic behavior of the suspended ceilings. To investigate the seismic behavior of the suspended ceilings, the study on the vibration behavior and seismic capacity of Korean suspended ceiling system, M-bar system ceiling and T-bar system ceiling were presented.

In this study, the static tests were performed in chapter 3 and the dynamic tests were performed in chapter 4. In chapter 3, to investigate the capacity of suspended ceiling components, the static tests were performed dividing by three stages

component level, joint level and module level. In chapter 4, shaking table tests were performed to examine the dynamic behavior of the suspended ceilings with horizontal excitation using El-Centro earthquake and Mexico City earthquake. The dynamic performance, such as acceleration response, displacement response, deformation, natural period etc. was evaluated.

In the shaking table tests, there was no system failure of ceiling in 1g level ground acceleration. Further experiments should be performed for seismic design for ceilings. Vertical excitation on shaking table tests, more than 1g level ground acceleration excitation, and ceiling with weight such as lights or air conditioner have to be considered for further experiments.