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1997 UBC Earthquake Design

Distribution of Seismic Forces to Primary LFRS

Now that we have the base shear force, what type of

induced forces act through the height of the building?
How to model the inertial force that acts opposite to
yank of paper on the cereal box?
Recall for wind loads
First, calculate loads/pressures over the height of
building.
Then developed base values.
These values are at the allowable stress level.
In contrast, with seismic First, determine base force.
Then determine and distribute forces over the height
of the building, called story forces, Fx.
There are two different sets of story forces distributed
to the primary LFRS:
For vertical elements, use Fx.
For horizontal elements, use Fpx.
Recall that the primary LFRS for a box building
= horizontal diaphragms and vertical shear
walls.
Then adjust these strength level forces by a
redundancy/reliability factor, r, and an allowable
stress factor of 1.4 discussed further in item d, below.
a. Story forces for vertical elements.
Used in design of shear walls and shear wall anchorage
at the foundation.
Determined before Fpx's.
Applied simultaneously at all levels.
Results in a triangular distribution of forces over a
multi-story building that has approximately equal floor
masses.

and

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Where:
Ft = roof level force accounting for whiplash
effect.

Ft

.07TV .25V or
0 if T .7 sec.

wx, wi = tributary weights at levels x and i.

hx, hi = height above base to levels x and i.

further detail can be found in '97 UBC 1630.5.

b. Story forces for horizontal elements.
At roof level, Fpx = Fx.
At other levels, Fpx > Fx.
Accounting for the possibility that larger instantaneous
forces can occur on individual diaphragms.
Applied individually to each level for the design of
that diaphragm.

where wpx = weight of diaphragm and elements

tributary to it at level x.
For masonry buildings (and concrete) supported by
flexible diaphragms, the R factor used to determine V
must be reduced to 4.0 from 4.5 ('97 UBC 1633.2.9.3).
For more information see '97 UBC 1630.6.
c. The single story building is a special case.
In most cases, T .7 and Ft then is taken as zero.

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From equation 30-15:

From equation 33-1:

Consequently, F1 = Fp1 = V for the case of wood

frame buildings.
For masonry buildings, Fp, is based upon a slightly
larger V due to R changing from 4.5 to 4.0 according
to '97 UBC 1633.2.9.3. In this case, then: F1 = V and
Fp1 = 1.125 V.
d. Redundancy/reliability factor and the 1.4 ASD adjustment:
In the load combination equations as discussed in the
last sub-module in the load module of this site, all
earthquake forces are generically called E.

Where:
Eh = load developed from V, (like Fx or Fpx) or
Fp, (the design force on a part of a structure).
Ev = 0 for ASD
r = redundancy/reliability factor, discussed
below.
E is at strength level and must be divided by 1.4 for
use in allowable stress design.
The application of 1.4 and p are shown in
example one of this sub-module.
The redundancy/reliability factor penalizes structures
in seismic zones 3 and 4 that do not have a reasonable
number and distribution of lateral force resisting
elements, such as shear walls. These structures with a
limited number of shearwalls are referred to as
non-redundant structures where the failure of one wall
loads to the total collapse of the structure.

Where:
AB = the ground floor area of the structure in

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ft2.
rmax = maximum element-story shear ratio, ri,
occurring at any story level in bottom 2/3 of the
structure. rmax identifies the least redundant
story.
ri = Rwall/Rstory(10/lw)
Where:
Rwall = shear in most heavily loaded wall
Rstory = total story force, Fx
lw = length of most heavily loaded shear
wall.
r = 1 when in seismic zones 0, 1, or 2.
r = 1 when calculating drift.
Upon careful inspection of the r and ri equation
with application to a single story, regular
building, we see:
To maintain a r = 1.0, the minimum length
of the most heavily loaded shear wall is
fixed as:

If a flexible diaphragm, a common

controlling case will be when Rwall/Rstory
= .5.
In this case then
to keep r =
1.0.
Although the Breyer, et al book uses the subscript "u"
to distinguish strength-level vs. allowable stress-level
loads, I have opted for a different convention that I
believe is simpler.
Upon modifying the various Eh values by r and
1.4, Eh becomes E'h. For our single story
building, the shear wall forces and diaphragm
forces at ASD level would look like:
F'1 = rF1 (1/1.4)
F'1 = rFp1 (1/1.4)

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1997 UBC Earthquake Design

Example 1

Develop the applicable seismic forces for a one-story, box-type industrial

building located in Southern California. Assume partially grouted CMU
walls weighing 61 lb/ft2, a roof dead load of 9 psf, and the building is not
located near (further than 9.3 miles) a seismic source. No geotechnical
investigation was completed.

1. Base shear coefficient, V.

The base shear equation(s) are quite cumbersome to use,
unless on knows beforehand which equation governs.

Recall that middle equation is for buildings medium to

long fundamental T's. The left-hand equations are lower
bound values. The right-hand equation is for short (stiff)
T buildings.
You can determine if its the right-hand equation quickly
by comparing the building's T to Ts:
TS is a limiting period of vibration that is used to
differentiate between stiff and flexible buildings.
The seismically-induced forces in stiff buildings
are related to the bedrock acceleration. The
forces in flexible buildings are related more to
bedrock velocity.

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