Analytical prediction of experimental building pounding

Abstract Valuable insights on the problem of seismic pounding have been obtained recently from analytical studies. So far, the proposed analytical models have not been validated experimentally. This paper presents the results of shake table tests of pounding between adjacent three‐ and eight‐storey single‐bay steel framed model structures. The pounding response of the frames was measured for various earthquake intensities and initial separations. The experimental results were compared to the predictions resulting from two existing pounding analysis programs. The solution strategy of the first program, SLAM‐2, is based on a modal superposition technique. The second program, PC‐ANSR, is a non‐linear time‐step analysis code in which an elastic gap element has been included. Modelling the pounding effect by elastic gap elements in the two programs produced accurate displacement and impact force results. Amplitudes of short acceleration pulses were not well predicted, however, for practical time‐step increments. Relative rotations between adjacent floors induced grinding contacts which cannot be captured by uni‐axial gap elements.