Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

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Thin-Walled Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tws

Dynamic analysis of non-planar coupled shear walls with stiffening

beams using Continuous Connection Method
O. Aksogan a, C.D. Turkozer b, E. Emsen c,n, R. Resatoglu d
a

Department of Civil Engineering, Toros University, 33140 Mersin, Turkey

Department of Civil Engineering, Cukurova University, 01330 Adana, Turkey
c
Department of Civil Engineering, Akdeniz University, 07058 Antalya, Turkey
d
Department of Civil Engineering, Near East University, Nicosia, Cyprus
b

art ic l e i nf o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Received 24 July 2013
Received in revised form
25 March 2014
Accepted 25 March 2014
Available online 7 May 2014

In this paper, the dynamic analysis of non-planar non-symmetrical coupled shear walls on a rigid
foundation has been considered. The analysis deals with coupled shear walls having a nite number of
stiffening beams, whose properties vary from region to region along the height. In the analysis,
Continuous Connection Method (CCM) and Vlasov's theory of thin-walled beams are employed to nd
the stiffness matrix of the structure. The system mass matrix has been found in the form of lumped
masses at the heights where the unit forces have been applied. Following the free vibration analysis,
uncoupled stiffness, damping and mass matrices have been found employing the mode superposition
method. A time-history analysis has been carried out using Newmark numerical integration method to
nd the system displacement vector for every time step. Finally, a computer program has been prepared
in Fortran language and an asymmetrical example has been solved. The results have been veried via
comparisons with those of the SAP2000 structural analysis program using frame method and a perfect
match has been observed.
& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Dynamic analysis
Non-planar
Coupled shear wall
Stiffening beam
Continuous Connection Method
Newmark method

1. Introduction
In modern tall buildings made of reinforced concrete, the
lateral loads induced by wind and earthquake are often resisted
by specially arranged shear walls. The most elementary shape in
which a shear wall is employed in a tall building is a planar shear
wall without openings. The behavior of such a shear wall is
essentially similar to a high, slender cantilever beam. Planar shear
wall components are usually located at the sides of the building or
in the form of a core which houses staircases or elevator shafts.
When one or more rows of openings divide the shear wall into
solid walls connected by lintel beams, the resulting structural
system is called a coupled shear wall. Pierced shear wall and
shear wall with openings are other commonly used terminologies for such structural elements in civil engineering practice.
Weakening of shear walls in tall buildings by doors, windows and
corridor openings is one of the most frequently encountered
problems of structural engineering. When the coupling action
between the walls separated by openings becomes important,
some of the external moment is resisted by the couple formed by
the axial forces in the walls due to the increase in the stiffness of

Corresponding author. Tel.: 90 242 3106385; fax: 90 242 3106306.

E-mail address: eemsen@akdeniz.edu.tr (E. Emsen).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tws.2014.03.018
0263-8231/& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

the coupled system by the connecting beams. In planar coupled

shear wall analyses, the lateral loads are applied in such a way that
the deformation of the shear wall is conned within its own plane.
Studies considering in-plane, out-of-plane and torsional deformations in the investigation of coupled shear walls are called non-planar
coupled shear wall analyses. Practically, the design of non-planar
coupled shear walls requires special consideration of dynamic behavior in the cases of winds and seismic loads. It is well known that the
deformation of a coupled shear wall subjected to lateral loading is not
conned to its plane. In other words, either applied loading is not
conned to the plane of the wall or the cross-sections of the connected
piers are not planar. In non-planar coupled shear walls under dynamic
loading, both the exural and torsional behaviors have to be taken into
account in the analysis. The bending analysis of the structure is rather
simple. However, its torsional analysis is rather difcult and needs to
be explained in detail. When thin-walled structures are twisted, there
is a so-called warping of the cross-section and the BernoulliNavier
hypothesis is violated. The warping of shear walls is greatly restrained
by the oor slabs and the foundations. A classical analysis of warping
torsion requires the prior evaluation of the shear center location, the
principal sectorial area diagram, the warping moment of inertia and
the torsion constant [1].
Rosman [2] introduced the Continuous Connection Method (CCM),
for the analysis of coupled shear walls, in which the individual beams
are replaced by continuous laminae. In the analysis of shear walls

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O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

Nomenclature
a
A
Aj
Aci
b
Bi
Bi

c
d
E
G
Gac
xgj ; ygj
H
hi
i
I ci
I xj ; I yj
I xyj
I j
I
I

distance between the centroids of the piers in

X-direction
a geometrical quantity, dened in (17)
cross-sectional area of the jth pier
cross-sectional area of connecting beams in region i
distance between the centroids of the piers in
Y-direction
resultant bimoment, about Z-axis, due to the resistance offered by the piers in region i
resultant bimoment, about Z-axis, due to the component bending moments and bimoments in region i
clear span of the connecting beams
a geometric property, dened in (5)
elasticity modulus
shear modulus
center of area in region i
coordinates of the centroid of jth pier, referring to
global axes, X and Y, respectively
total height of shear wall
storey height in region i
region number
moment of inertia of connecting beams in region i
moments of inertia of pier j w.r.t. global X and Y-axes,
respectively
product of inertia of pier j w.r.t. global X and Y-axes in
region i
sectorial moment of inertia of pier j
sum of the sectorial moments of inertia of the two
piers at the point on Z-axis
a geometrical constant, dened in (17)

with the CCM and Vlasov's theory [3] of thin-walled beams, following
an approach similar to the one used by Tso and Biswas [4], both the
exural and the torsional behavior are taken into account. The
deformation of a coupled shear wall subjected to lateral loading is
not always conned to one plane. Thus, the present analysis is a three
dimensional analysis of coupled shear walls. There are many studies,
in the literature, about this subject concerning static behavior [49].
When the height restrictions prevent connecting beams from
fullling their tasks of reducing the maximum total shear wall
bending moments at the bottom and the maximum lateral
displacements at the top, beams with high moments of inertia,
called stiffening beams, are placed at certain heights to make up
for this deciency. Stiffening of coupled shear walls decreases the
lateral displacements, thus, rendering an increase in the height of
the building possible. Hence, assigning some stories of the building as storages, service areas and the like and placing high beams
on those oors seems to be a logical solution [6,7,911].
All of the dynamic analyses in the literature on stiffened
coupled shear walls concern themselves with planar coupled shear
walls [1215]. No study has been made concerning the dynamic
analysis of stiffened non-planar coupled shear walls, so far.
The free vibration analysis of non-planar coupled shear walls
employing the CCM consists of two steps. In the rst step, the
structure is considered as a discrete system of lumped masses at
the selected levels along the height of the structure. Lumped
masses are concentrated at the center of the whole cross-sectional
area of the structure. Since each point has three degrees of
freedom, in X, Y and theta directions, the dimension of the mass
matrix is equal to 3N  3N, where N represents the number of

I X , I Y sectional properties, dened in (11)

j
pier number
K1, K2, K3, K4 geometrical quantities related to moments of
inertia, dened in (17)
Mti
resultant torque, about Z-axis, due to resistance
offered by piers in region i
Mti
resultant torque, about Z-axis, due to component
shears and torques in region i
m
total degree of freedom of the structure (m 3  N)
n
number of regions in vertical direction
N
total number of lumped masses
O(X,Y,Z) orthogonal system of global axes
P(t)
the dynamic force acting on the structure
qi
shear ow in laminae per unit length in region i
r
a geometrical constant, dened in (17)
Sj
shear center of jth pier
xsj ; ysj
coordinates of the shear center of the jth pier, referring to global axes, X and Y, respectively
Ti
axial force in region i
t
thickness of a thin-walled beam
Vi
shear force in ith stiffening beam
z
spatial coordinate measured along the height of the
structure
1i, 2i, 3i geometrical constants, dened in (17)
i (theta)rotational global displacement of the rigid diaphragm
in region i
j
sectorial area of pier j at the point on Z-axis

circular frequency
j
angle between the global axes and the principal axes
of jth pier
i
a constant property of connecting beams, dened in (6)

a geometrical constant, dened in (17)

masses. However, the mass matrix elements associated with the

rotational degrees of freedom will be zero because of the assumption that the mass is lumped in nodes which have no rotational
inertia. Thus, the lumped-mass matrix is a diagonal matrix which
will include zero diagonal elements for the rotational degrees of
freedom. The second step is the determination of the stiffness
matrix of the structure for the degrees of freedom chosen during
the rst step. This procedure is carried out by applying two
horizontal unit forces in the directions of X and Y-axes and one
unit moment about Z-axis at every height with a lumped mass. For
every one of these loadings, a solution is carried out making use of
the CCM. This is accomplished by writing down the compatibility
equation for the vertical displacements at the mid-points of the
connecting beams and employing equilibrium equations the
corresponding displacements are obtained. Then, the displacements of the points where the lumped masses are located are
determined using the rigid oor diaphragm assumption. Thus,
each unit loading gives one column of the exibility matrix as the
displacements at the points where the lumped masses are. Hence,
the analysis for the three loading cases for one mass will sufce to
introduce the complete solution procedure for the exibility
matrix. The stiffness matrix of the structure will be determined
by taking the inverse of the exibility matrix. Substituting the
mass and stiffness matrices, thus obtained, in the equations of
motion for free vibration, the system of equations for the problem
in hand is obtained.
The forced vibration analysis of the structure is resolved by
uncoupling the system of differential equations obtained, using
mode superposition technique, which renders the mass and

O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

stiffness matrices diagonal. The Newmark method [16], one of the

numerous numerical methods available in the literature, is
employed to carry out the time-history analysis.

97

x
x

Y2

S2

2. Dynamic analysis
Y1

2.1. Free vibration analysis

 The geometric properties are constant throughout each region i




along the height.

The discrete set of connecting beams with bending stiffness EIci
in region i are replaced by an equivalent continuous connecting
medium of exural rigidity EIci/hi per unit length in the vertical
direction.
Vlasov's theory for thin-walled beams of open section is valid
for each pier.
The outline of a transverse section of the coupled shear wall at
a oor level remains unchanged in plan (due to the rigid
diaphragm assumption for oors).

lumped masses

z1

M1
(1)

M2

h1

z2

M3
M4

h2

(2)

z3

stiffened
stories

(3)

zi-1
(i-1)

zi
H

hi-1

(i)

zn-1
hn-1

zn

MN-1

(n)

hn

O
2nd pier
c

Fig. 2. Plan of non-planar coupled shear wall in region i.

 The discrete shear forces in the connecting beams in region i





are replaced by an equivalent continuous shear ow function qi,

per unit length in the vertical direction along the mid-points of
the connecting laminae.
The torsional stiffnesses of the connecting and stiffening beams
are neglected.
The walls and beams are assumed to be linearly elastic and the
material is same throughout the structure.
BernoulliNavier hypothesis is assumed to be valid for the
connecting and stiffening beams.

A non-planar coupled shear wall and its plan for one region are
given in Figs. 1 and 2 with global axes OX, OY and OZ, the origin
being at the mid-point of the clear span in the base plane. The
X-axis is parallel to the longitudinal direction of the connecting
beams. The Z-axis is the vertical axis and the Y-axis is such that it
completes an orthogonal right-handed system of axes. During the
deformation, the outline of a transverse section of the shear wall
remains unchanged (Fig. 2).
Referring to the axes OX and OY, the coordinates of the
centroids of the piers are taken to be xg1 ; yg1 andxg2 ; yg2 ,
respectively. Throughout this study, the subscripts 1 and 2 express
the left and the right piers, respectively. The subscript i
i 1; 2; ; n, refers to the number of a region. Similarly, the shear
centers of the piers are located at xs1 ; ys1 and xs2 ; ys2 , respectively. The coordinates referred to the principal axes of pier j
j 1; 2 which are represented by X j ; Y j , making an angle j with
the respective global axes are shown in Fig. 2. The Z j axis is parallel
to the global Z-axis.
The axial force in each pier is found by writing down the
vertical force equilibrium equation for the part of one pier above
any horizontal cross-section as
!
Z
Z
zi

qi  T 0i
(n-1)

G1

y
y

i1

zt

t1

zt 1

qi dz

qt dz V t
t1

i 1; 2; ; n

where V i is the shear force in ith stiffening beam [7]. A cut through
the points of contra-exure of laminae exposes the shear ow qi.
The vertical force equilibrium of a dz element of one pier yields the
relation

(i+1)

connecting beam

1st pier

Ti

hi

zi+1

G2

X1

S1

The analysis started by discretizing the continuous mass of the

non-planar coupled shear wall [1215]. The mass matrix of the
non-planar coupled shear wall was found as a diagonal matrix
employing a lumped mass approach. To explain this procedure, the
top, bottom and each height at which there is a stiffening beam
and/or change of wall thickness will be called ends and the part
between any two consecutive ends will be called a region. Each
region is divided into suitable number of parts with corresponding
amounts of masses (Fig. 1).
Having formed the mass matrix as described in the previous
paragraph, the CCM is used to determine the stiffness matrix. The
basic assumptions of the CCM for non-planar coupled shear walls
can be summarized as follows:

X2

MN

O
Fig. 1. Non-planar stiffened coupled shear wall and its lumped mass model.

where a prime denotes differentiation with respect to z.

While obtaining the compatibility equations, all connecting
laminae are cut through their mid-points, which are the points of
zero moment.
The vertical displacement due to bending can be obtained as
the product of the slope at the section considered and the distance
of the point on the vertical through point O from the respective

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O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

neutral axis. In addition, vertical displacement arises, also, due to

the twisting of the piers, and is equal to the value of the twist at
the section considered, times the sectorial area, , at the point on
the vertical through point O.
For the compatibility of displacements, the relative vertical
displacements of the cut ends must be equal to zero. Hence,
"
#
 Z zj
1 n
1
1
0
0
0

ui a vi b i d 

T j dz
E j i1
A1 A2
zj 1

Z z


1 1
1
T 0 hi c3
1:2hi c

0
3

T i dz i

E A1 A2
GAci
E 12EI ci
zi 1
in which

1  2
a xg 2  xg 1 ;

4
b yg2 yg1 ;

d xs2 yg2  ys2 xg2 ys1 xg1  xs1 yg1

EI u
EI u

Y
G2
G1

EI v

EI v

and 1 and 2 are the sectorial areas at points on the left and right
sides of the cut for piers 1 and 2, respectively. ui , vi and i are the
global displacements (i 1; 2; ; n). Differentiating this equation
with respect to z and letting

hi c3
1:2hi c

GAci
12EI ci

the following equation is obtained:



1 1
1
T
ui a vi b i d 

T i 0
E A1 A2 i E i

i 1; 2; ; n

The successive terms in (3) represent the contributions of the

bending of the piers about the principal axes, the twisting of the
piers, the axial deformation of the piers, the bending deformation
in the laminae and the shearing deformation in the piers,
respectively.
The coordinate system and positive directions of internal
bending moments acting on the different components of the shear
wall are adapted as shown vectorially in Fig. 3.
These internal moments, along with the couple produced by
the axial force, Ti, balance the external bending moments M EX i and
M EY i . The equilibrium of the moments about X and Y-axes can be
written as
M EY i EI Y ui EI XY vi  EI Y i T i a

M EX i EI XY ui EI X vi EI X i T i b

where
X

I Y I y1 I y2 ;

I X I x1 I x2 ;

I XY I xy1 I xy2

10

I X xs1 I x1 xs2 I x2  ys1 I xy1  ys2 I xy2 ;

a
Fig. 3. Internal bending moments.

I
rigid arms

I Y ys1 I y1 ys2 I y2 xs1 I xy1  xs2 I xy2

hinges placed along

vertical wall joints

11

beam member

column
member

Fig. 4. Conventional wide-column-frame analogy for the analysis of three dimensional coupled wall structures.

O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

hinges placed along

vertical wall joints

rigid arms

99

beam member

column
member

storey
levels

Fig. 5. Arrangement of wall and beam elements.

In these equations, I yj and I xj are the second moments of area,

and I xyj is the product of inertia of the cross-section of pier j (j1, 2)
with respect to axes parallel to the global axes passing through its
centroid.
In order to obtain the bimoment equilibrium equation, the
coupled shear wall will be cut through by a horizontal plane such
that an upper part is isolated from the lower part of the structure.
Equating the external bimoment, BEi , to the internal resisting
bimoments, the bimoment equilibrium equations for all regions
of the structure can be written as follows:
BE i Bi Bi

Z
P(t)

O'

1st region

h=3m

12

BEi EI Y ui  EI X vi  EI i  dT i

i 1; 2; ; n

Stiffened
storey

h=3m
2nd region
Y

14
0

M Eti EI Y i ui  EI X i vi GJ i i  EI i i  i di T 0i

15

point O, which is due to the resistance offered by the piers and M ti

is the resultant twisting moment due to the additional torques
and the shear forces about the point on the vertical line through
0
point O. Expressions GJ i i are the St. Venant twisting moments and

expressions  EI i i are the additional twisting moments due to

the non-uniform warping of the piers along the height.
Using the compatibility Eq. (3) and the four equilibrium Eqs.
(8), (9), (13), and (15), the 4n unknowns of the problem, namely ui ,
vi , i , and T i , can be found under the applied loadings M EX i , M EY i ,
BEi , and M Et i . The elimination of ui , vi and i from Eqs. (7)(9), (13),
and (15) yields the following differential equation for T i :
1i T 0000
EY i I K 3 K 1 r
i 3i T i  M
i  2i T
GJ
M EY i K 3 M EX i K 4 M 0Eti r
E

16

where M t i is the resultant torque about the vertical axis through

 MEX i I K 4  K 2 r

30 m

13

where Bi is the resultant bimoment, which is due to the resistance

offered by the piers, and Bi is the resultant bimoment due to the
additional bending moments and bimoments, both, about the
vertical axis through point O. I is the sectorial moments of inertia
of the two piers.
In order to obtain the twisting moment equilibrium equation,
the coupled shear wall will be cut through by a horizontal plane
such that an upper free body diagram is isolated from the rest of
the structure. Equating the external twisting moment, M Eti , to the
internal resisting moments, the twisting moment equilibrium
equation for all regions of the structure can be written as follows:
M Eti M t i M t i

H = 48 m

Fig. 6. Non-planar structure with a stiffening beam.

in which,
I GJ i
GJ

r 2 ; 3i ;
EA
A
E
I X I Y I XY I X
I XY I Y I Y I X
K1
; K2
;

1i i I ;

2i

K3

aI X  bI XY

K4 

aI XY  bI Y

r d aK 1  bK 2 ; I I I X K 2  I Y K 1 ;


1
1
1

aK 3 bK 4 ; I X I Y  I 2XY

A
A1 A2

17

100

O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

in which,

In Eq. (16), M EX i and M EY i are the external bending moments and

M Eti is the external twisting moment for unit loadings about the
respective global axes and can be written as
M EX i H  z1 ;

M EY i H  z1 ;

M Eti dPY dPX

v
q1
u0
u  2  4
u
2i
1i 3i A
;
1i t@ 2i
21i

18

Eq. (16) is written for each region separately. However, in this

context when the unit load is applied at an internal point of a
region, it divides that region into two new regions. The system
of Macaulay's brackets should be understood, here and in the
sequel, as
z  z0 n z  z0 n

and

z  z0 n 0

z  z0 0 0 if z o z0

and

19

where dPX and dPY are the moment arms of the components of the
unit force from point O. Substituting expressions (18) in (16) and
solving the resulting differential equation, Ti is found as follows:

2m

ui
20

2m

21

To determine the integration constants D1i to D4i in the single

fourth order differential equation, the boundary conditions at the
top, bottom and between each pair of consecutive regions are
employed. Substituting them in expression (20), the general
solution for Ti i 1; 2; ; n can be found.
The lateral displacement and rotation functions for unit loadings
can be found using (8,9,15) as follows:
 
Z Z 
1
T
 M EX i K 3i M EX i K 4i i  Ti ci dz dz G1i zi G2i
i
Er i
Ai
22

z  z0 0 1 if z 4 z0

T i D1i sin h1i z D2i cos h1i z D3i sin h2i z

1
GJ K M K 4i M EX i 
D4i cos h2i z
3i E i 3i EY i

v
q1
u0
u 2  4
u
2i
1i 3i A
2i t@ 2i
21i

1
E

 
Z Z 
M EX i I XY i M EY i I X i
Ei K 1i  T i K 3i 

dz dz R1i zi R2i

23

2m

2m

3m
Y

0.4 m

0.2 m
10

11

(-3, 4)

10

(-5, 4)

(-1, 4)

(1, 4)

(4, 4)
3

0.4 m

0.2 m

4m

0.4 m

(-7, 4)

0.4 m

Gac (-0.795, 0.322)

0.2 m

3m

(-7, 0)

P(t)

(-5, 0)

(-3, 0)

0.4 m

2
1

0.4 m

O
1

(-1, 0)

(1, 0)

2
(4, 0)

0.4 m

0.2 m
7

0.2 m

0.4 m

0.4 m

0.4 m
6

(-7, -3)

(-3, -3)

4m

(-1, -3)

2m

6
(4, -3)

(1, -3)

2m

3m

Fig. 7. Cross-sectional view of the structure and applied dynamic load.

Table 1
Geometrical properties of the piers.
Aj

Cross-sectional area of the jth pier

GXj, GYj

Coordinates of centroid of the jth pier, referring to global axes, X and Y, respectively

IXj, IYj

Moments of inertia of the jth pier w.r.t. axes passing through the centroid parallel to global axes

IXYj

Product of inertia of the jth pier w.r.t. axes passing through the centroid parallel to global axes

Jj

St. Venant torsional constant (moment of inertia) of the jth pier

SXj, SYj

Coordinates of shear center of the jth pier, referring to global axes, X and Y, respectively

Ij

Sectorial moment of inertia of the jth pier

Sectorial area of the jth pier at point O

A1
A2
GX1, GY1
GX2, GY2
IX1, IY1
IX2, IY2
IXY1
IXY2
J1
J2
SX1, SY1
SX2, SY2
I1
I2
1
2

8.200 m2
6.400 m2
 3.878 m, 0.256 m
3.156 m, 0.406 m
51.30 m4, 31.05 m4
41.12 m4, 6.281 m4
 0.156 m4
0.394 m4
0.317 m4
0.341 m4
 4.920 m,  5.710 m
5.079 m, 0.401 m
319.26 m6
40.779 m6
 14.198 m2
 1.110 m2

O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

vi

1
E

Z Z 

 Ei K 2i  T i K 4i 

M EY i I XY i

M EX i I Y i


dz

cases with a high degree of freedom. The solution can be rendered

simpler by employing the mode superposition method. In this
method, the displacement vector, Y , in equation set (27) being
expressed in terms of the modal displacement vector, U , in the
following form:

dz N 1i zi N 2i

24
where the boundary conditions and the equivalence of the horizontal displacements and the respective slopes for every pair of
neighboring regions at their common boundary (zzi) are used to
determine the integration constants.
Having determined the displacements for unit loadings at each
and every one of the levels of lumped masses, the exibility
matrix, and thereby, the stiffness matrix of the structure can be
found. Finally, the circular frequencies are determined from the
following standard frequency equation for the lumped mass
system:
jK  Mj 0
2

Y U

~ U C~ U_ K~ U P~ t
M

29

in which tildas show that the corresponding vectors are modied.

The computation of the displacements or member end forces of
the structure under time dependent loads is called the time-history
analysis. When equation set (29) is examined, it is, obviously, seen
to be a set of second order differential equations and, especially, for
non-planar coupled shear walls with many degrees of freedom, the
solution gets considerably hard and time consuming. Different
numerical solution methods have been developed to render the
solution easier and to reduce the computation time. One of these
methods is the Newmark method which has been used in the
present work [16].

25

i 1; 2; ; m

28

and this expression and its derivatives being substituted in (27),

the following uncoupled equation set is obtained:

where is the circular frequency, M is the mass matrix and K is the

stiffness matrix of the structure. The respective modal vectors, si ,
are found by substituting each and every circular frequency, i , in
the following equation at a time:
K  i Msi 0

101

26

2.2. Forced vibration analysis

3. Comparison of present method with frame method
In the forced vibration analysis of multi-degree of freedom
structures, the solution of the equation set gets harder as the
degree of freedom increases and, especially, as the time increment
decreases or the number of steps increases. In such cases, the
amount of computation increases, also, and a high computer
capacity is needed. The equation of motion pertaining to the
non-planar coupled shear walls, for which the mass and stiffness
matrices were determined in the previous section, can be written
as follows:
M Y C Y K Y P t

The frame method was extended to analyze the three dimensional coupled shear/core wall structures by treating the nonplanar shear/core walls as assemblies of two dimensional planar
wall units individually as discrete column members residing at the
centroidal axis of the wall units as shown in Fig. 4a and b,
respectively. In the extended method, in order to allow connection
between adjacent planar wall units to form the non-planar walls,
the nodes are placed along the vertical wall joints instead of
column members at the centers of the wall units and to the ends of
the coupling beams. In this frame model, so that the wall crosssection can undergo warping deformations, the ends of the rigid
arms on the connection lines of the shear wall units are donated
with hinges rotating freely about lines normal to the shear wall
units. The connecting beams are rigidly connected to the rigid

27

in which P(t) is the dynamic force acting on the structure.

It is observed that every equation in the set of Eq. (27) involves
entities belonging to each and every node. Despite the fact that the
solution of this equation set is possible, it gets rather difcult for

10.613

-6.546

6.974

-3.821
_

_ -8.808

-6.546 _

-3.821

_
+
-25.966

I = 40.779 m6

I = 319.258 m6
1.775
1.775

2.933

2.933
+

0.496

_
= -1.110

-9.646

-0.708

-8.488
= -14.198

8.016
+

3.734
_ -2.826

8.016

+
_

-2.826

-8.247

-6.470

Fig. 8. The principal sectorial area diagram of the cross-section.

3.734

102

O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

arms such that the rotations of the beams at the beam-wall joints
are equal to those of the rigid arms. This method was developed in
the 1970s by Macleod [17,18] (Fig. 4).
In this study, the non-planar coupled shear wall structures are
analyzed using Macleod's frame method [17,18], also, for comparison
purposes. The shear wall structures consist of interconnected planar
walls. The central wall panel has a row of openings and is thus in
effect a pair of coupled shear walls. The coupled non-planar wall
structure is therefore actually composed of planar wall units and a
row of coupling beams. In Macleod's method [17,18], the planar wall
units are modeled as column members in wide column analogy.
Macleod's 3-D wide-column-frame analogy for core wall analysis has
been improved over the time in the literature [1921].
Fig. 5 shows the arrangement of the wall and beam elements
used in the analysis for comparison. In this study, as a modication
to Macleod's method [17,18], additional rigid beam members are
placed between the storey levels to improve the continuity of the
connection between the wall units. This modication was observed
to improve the results by various comparisons with the CCM.
In this study, the shear deformation of the walls is automatically
neglected due to the second assumption in Vlasov's theory [3]. This
causes over stiffness in the walls. For comparison purposes the shear
deformation is neglected in SAP2000 [22,23] applications, also.

Table 2
Comparison of the natural frequencies (Hz) obtained from the present program and
SAP2000 for unstiffened case.
Mode

Unstiffened case
1
0.50138
2
0.66135
3
2.47098
4
4.12617
5
6.51577
6
11.50762
7
12.51956
8
20.48279
9
22.45812
10
30.36957

In the literature, there is no analytical work about the dynamic

analysis of stiffened non-planar coupled shear walls. In order to

SAP2000 (frame method)

Natural freq. (Hz)

% Difference

0.50047
0.66117
2.46396
4.11839
6.47507
11.45595
12.37532
20.10512
22.27115
29.54952

0.18
0.03
0.29
0.19
0.63
0.45
1.17
1.88
0.84
2.78

Table 3
Comparison of the natural frequencies (Hz) obtained from the present program and
SAP2000 for stiffened case.
Mode

4. Numerical results

Present study (CCM)

Natural freq. (Hz)

Present study (CCM)

Natural freq. (Hz)

Stiffened case
1
0.62562
2
0.66052
3
2.60238
4
4.11919
5
6.63493
6
11.48704
7
12.96880
8
20.42581
9
22.44974
10
30.66376

Fig. 9. Triangular pulse force P(t).

Fig. 10. Frame model of the structure and its 3-D view.

SAP2000 (frame method)

Natural freq. (Hz)

% Difference

0.62284
0.66030
2.58037
4.11147
6.57733
11.43606
12.77066
20.05863
22.26720
29.81654

0.45
0.03
0.85
0.19
0.88
0.45
1.55
1.83
0.82
2.84

O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

verify the present method, examples were solved both by the

present method (CCM) and by the frame method using the
SAP2000 structural analysis program [22,23].
As an example, the dynamic analysis of a non-planar nonsymmetrical coupled shear wall with and without a stiffening
beam was carried out using the present program and the SAP2000
structural analysis program. The forced vibration analysis of the
shear wall was carried out for damped and undamped cases.
A stiffening beam of 3.0 m height was placed at the level of 30 m
on the tenth storey (Fig. 6).
The total height of the shear wall is 48 m, the storey height is 3.0 m
and the thicknesses of the piers and the connecting beams are shown
in Fig. 7. The height of the connecting beams is 0.4 m and the elasticity
and shear moduli are E 2.85  106 kN/m2 and G1.06  106 kN/m2,
respectively. The geometrical properties of the piers of the example
structure are presented in Table 1. The sectorial area diagram of the
cross-section of the structure is given in Fig. 8.
According to the lumped mass idealization, the lumped masses,
which were calculated by the computer program, were concentrated at the center of the whole cross-sectional area of the
structure. The coordinates of the center of area were calculated
as Gac (  0.795; 0.322).
The dynamic load, P(t), was applied at the top of the structure
in the global X-direction in the plane of the connection beam as
shown in Figs. 6 and 7 and it was chosen to be the triangular pulse
force which is given as in Fig. 9.

103

The structure was solved both by the present method using the
CCM and by the SAP2000 structural analysis program [22,23]
using the frame method for which the model and its 3-D view are
given in Fig. 10.
Tables 2 and 3 compare the rst twenty natural frequencies
corresponding to each mode found by the program prepared in
the present work, and the SAP2000 structural analysis program,
expressing the percentage differences.
In each method, after obtaining the natural frequencies for
unstiffened and stiffened cases of the non-planar coupled shear
wall, the mode shape vectors of the system were found, also. Mode
shapes in X, Y and theta directions were compared after normalizing them with respect to their values at the top of the structure.
Fig. 11 presents the mode shapes of the coupled shear wall for
the stiffened case found by the present program and the SAP2000
structural analysis program and Fig. 12 compares the mode shapes
of the shear wall for stiffened and unstiffened cases.
At the top of the shear wall, the maximum displacement in the
X-direction for point Gac was calculated by the computer program
prepared in the present study and compared with those of the
SAP2000 structural analysis program in Tables 4 and 5 for both
damped and undamped cases. Damping ratio was chosen to be 5%
for this example.
The responses for both damped and undamped systems to
rectangular force were determined and the time-varying displacements in the X-direction for point Gac are presented in Figs. 13 and 14.

Fig. 11. Comparison of the rst, the second and the third mode shapes in X, Y and theta directions which are found both by the present program and SAP2000 for the
stiffened case.

Fig. 12. Comparison of rst, second and third mode shapes in X, Y and theta directions for the stiffened and unstiffened cases.

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O. Aksogan et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 82 (2014) 95104

Table 4
Maximum displacement (m) of point Gac in the X-direction for the unstiffened case.
Unstiffened case

Present study
(CCM)

SAP2000
(frame method)

% Difference

Undamped
Damped

0.035658
0.035192

0.035710
0.035270

0.14
0.22

Table 5
Maximum displacement (m) of point Gac in the X-direction for the stiffened case.
Stiffened case

Present study
(CCM)

SAP2000
(frame method)

% Difference

Undamped
Damped

0.023820
0.022860

0.024550
0.023570

3.06
3.01

stiffened and unstiffened cases. The results obtained are compared

with those of SAP2000 [22,23] and a good agreement is observed.
Second, the forced vibration analysis is carried out and the timevarying displacements have been plotted in Figs. 13 and 14 for the
stiffened and unstiffened cases. As seen in the gures, the stiffening of
coupled shear walls causes a decrease in the maximum displacement
at the top of a building. Thus, using such stiffening beams the heights
of buildings can be increased more.
The method proposed in this study has two main advantages.
First, the data preparation is much easier compared to the frame
method. Therefore, the probability of obtaining incorrect results
due to modeling errors is reduced. Second, modeling and computation time needed is much shorter compared to the other
methods for non-planar coupled shear walls. Hence, the method
presented is very useful for pre-design and dimensioning purposes
while determining the geometry of non-planar coupled shear wall
structures. Furthermore, through this study, the dynamic behavior
of the non-planar coupled shear walls is determined analytically.

0.040
0.035
0.030

Top displacement (m)

Acknowledgments

Unstiffened case

0.025

Stiffened case

The nancial support of the Scientic Research Projects Units of

Cukurova University, Akdeniz University and Near East University
are gratefully acknowledged.

0.020
0.015
0.010
0.005

References

0.000
-0.005

-0.010

10

Time (s)

-0.015
-0.020

Fig. 13. Variation with time for the displacements in X-direction at the top of the
shear wall for undamped case.

Fig. 14. Variation with time for the displacements in X-direction at the top of the
shear wall for damped case with 5% damping ratio.

5. Conclusion
In this study, the dynamic analysis of non-planar coupled shear
walls with any number of stiffening beams, resting on rigid
foundations, is carried out. In the analysis, Continuous Connection
Method (CCM) and Vlasov's theory of thin-walled beams are
employed to nd the structure stiffness matrix.
As an example structure, a sixteen storied non-symmetrical nonplanar coupled shear wall has been considered. In the example, a
stiffening beam of 3.0 m height is placed at the height of 30 m on the
tenth storey. First, free vibration analysis is carried out. Thus, the
natural frequencies and mode shape vectors are obtained for the

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