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Design recommendations for self-centering buckling restrained braces

Article in Engineering Structures · December 2022

DOI: 10.1016/j.engstruct.2022.115019

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 Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Engineering Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/engstruct

Design recommendations for self-centering buckling restrained braces

Ying Zhou , Wenbo Tian , Yi Xiao *
State Key Laboratory of Disaster Reduction in Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Self-centering buckling-restrained braces (SC-BRBs) have typical flag-shaped hysteresis. Differing from con­
Self-centering ventional buckling-restrained braces (BRBs) which can result in significant residual drifts, the SC-BRB in­
Buckling-restrained brace corporates additional prestressing elements, so that it can recenter after earthquakes, which is critical for seismic
Energy dissipative brace
resilience. Current seismic design procedures can be used to calculate the key properties of conventional braces
Parametric study
Component properties
(e.g. BRB), but they cannot be used to determine the additional hysteretic properties of SC-BRB braces. To
Seismic performance achieve a comprehensive understanding of the performances of SC-BRB systems and develop their design rec­
Design recommendation ommendations, this paper conducted a parametric study of two typical SC-BRB systems, using a 12-story steel
braced frame office building. Then, the overall behavior of the SC-BRB system was compared with those of a BRB
system and two self-centering energy dissipative brace systems. The selection of SC-BRB properties appeared to
be a tradeoff between demands on component properties and seismic performances. The criteria for propor­
tioning the system were suggested. Numerical results showed that, although the SC-BRB systems had smaller
residual drifts than the BRB system, they generated more significant high-mode effect than the other comparable
systems.

1. Introduction
Buckling-restrained brace (BRB) is a type of brace member used to
resist seismic effects, which consists of a core steel that is subjected to
axial loads and a lateral constraint that prevents the core steel from
buckling in compression, therefore, allowing it to yield in both tension
and compression. The seismic response of the structure can be controlled
by the yielding energy dissipation of the BRB core steel during earth­
quakes. However, a BRB dissipates seismic energy through plastic
deformation of its core steel, which can lead to large residual de­
formations in the main structure after strong earthquakes [1–2].
Consequently, the repair cost of a BRB-controlled structure after severe
loadings can be significant.
Earthquake resilience requires not only life safety, but also rapid
functional recovery after earthquakes [3–5]. To increase the resilience
of structures, various innovative technologies have been developed. An
attractive technique is introducing post-tensioned prestressing technol­
ogy (i.e., self-centering system) into BRB, to provide a re-centering ca­
pacity [6–10]. This new brace, namely self-centering BRB (SC-BRB), is
capable of controlling structural peak response while nearly eliminating
residual deformations. Compared with other structural resilient tech­
nologies, such as self-centering wall structures and self-centering frame
structures, a braced frame equipped with SC-BRB requires only minor
changes to the structure. It is also relatively easy to achieve compati­
bility of deformations among structural and non-structural components.
Therefore, the SC-BRB has a broad application prospect.
In the past decade, various SC-BRBs have been developed and their
seismic performances have been investigated. Miller et al. [9,11–12] and
Zhou et al. [13–15] introduced pretensioned superplastic NiTi shape
memory alloy (SMA) rods and pretensioned basalt fiber-reinforced
polymer (BFRP) composite tendons into SC-BRB, respectively, and
demonstrated their excellent self-centering properties and deformation
capability through tests. Chou et al. [8] doubled the axial deformation
capacity of SC-BRB by arranging two sets of tensioning elements in
parallel. Consequently, conventional steel tendons could be used in SC-
BRB. Moreover, Zhou et al. [14] proved a frame equipped with SC-BRB
generated much smaller residual drifts than those equipped with BRB
under major earthquakes. Besides SC-BRBs that use post-tensioned
prestressing technology and BRB yielding mechanism, researchers also
developed other self-centering braces that use various re-centering and
energy dissipative mechanisms. In terms of recentering, the use of ring
springs [17–18] and Belleville springs [10] have been investigated. In
terms of energy dissipative mechanism, the use of friction [6], tensile-
only metallic yielding [19], viscous [18,20] and viscoelastic

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: yixiao@tongji.edu.cn (Y. Xiao).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.engstruct.2022.115019
Received 9 September 2021; Received in revised form 12 September 2022; Accepted 24 September 2022
0141-0296/© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 1. The configuration of SC-BRB: (a) conceptual configuration; (b) in tension; and (c) in compression.
mechanisms [17] have been investigated. For example, Wang et al. [21]
proposed a self-centering damper equipped with friction springs, which
was then successfully combined with rocking core concepts, to develop
several types of self-centering energy-absorbing rocking core system
[22–25].
The SC-BRB, no matter what type of tendon material is used, has a
flag-shaped force–deformation hysteresis, which is critical to the self-
centering behavior of the system. This property, however, also in­
creases the difficulty and complexity of its design process. For example,
areas of the brace components, prestressing forces and tube stiffnesses
are of vital importance in the design of SC-BRB. Even tube length
fabrication tolerance will have an impact on the performance of SC-BRB
[15].
The excellent seismic performance of SC-BRBs and the complexity of
the design process create an essential demand for criterions in propor­
tioning the SC-BRB flag-shaped hysteretic parameters. Xie [16] selected
four parameters for the design of SC-BRBs. These four parameters are the
ratio of the strength of self-centering system to the strength of BRB (β),
the ratio of the first stiffness of self-centering system to the initial stiff­
ness of BRB (αc ), the ratio of the post-yielding stiffness of SC-BRB to the
initial stiffness of BRB (αs ) and the ratio of the yield deformation of BRB
to the brace deformation when the tendon fractures (γ). However, except
γ, none of the other three parameters can be reflected directly in the
hysteresis of SC-BRB since they use the strength and the stiffness of the
component of SC-BRB (either self-centering system or BRB) in the
definition. Therefore, it is difficult to intuitively identify any hysteresis
from the selected four parameters, making them inconvenient in the
design of the system. In addition, Ref. [16] is restricted to the SC-BRB
using BFRP tendons and may not be feasible to other SC-BRBs.
The proportions of SC-BRBs must also be selected with the
2
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
consideration of the demands on structural components, which has not
been investigated. The necessity of considering component demands is
that they are highly correlated with the system cost to construct the
structure. For example, if only the peak and residual deformation re­
sponses are considered, a SC-BRB with large proportions of the elastic
self-centering system is favorable. However, such a brace results in large
axial forces that will be imposed to adjoining connections and other
structural components. As a result, these components have to be ca­
pacity designed for even larger strengths, which causes high system cost,
otherwise they may be subjected to significant damage under earth­
quakes. An appropriate proportion criterion needs to consider both de­
mands on component properties and seismic performances.
Another interesting topic is whether the SC-BRBs can achieve better
seismic performance, with reasonable demands on component proper­
ties, than other comparable systems. Several numerical studies had
compared the seismic performances of SC-BRB systems with the BRB
system [12,26], but little knowledge is available of the comparison be­
tween SC-BRB and self-centering energy dissipative (SCED) braces,
which adopt frictions for energy dissipation [6,7].
To solve these problems and have a better understanding of the SC-
BRB systems’ performance, this paper selects a new set of parameters
that can intuitively represent the braces’ hysteresis and investigates
their effects on component property demands and a wide range of
seismic performances. Based on extensive parametric studies using a 12-
story steel braced frame example office building and 78 ground motion
records, design recommendations for the SC-BRB using BFRP tendons
[13] and the SC-BRB using SMA rod tendons [9] are presented. Then, the
comparison of the SC-BRB systems’ overall properties with those for a
BRB system and two SCED systems is presented.
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

k
k
k

F
F F

Fig. 2. The hysteresis of SC-BRB.

2. Hysteretic Parameters of SC-BRBs as θfrac =δfrac /(Hcos(β)) as shown in Fig. 2, where β is the brace incli­
nation to the horizontal direction. αF equals to Fclose /Fy , where Fclose is
2.1. Concept of SC-BRBs the brace force when the gap between the two axial tubes closes during
unloading. αδ is the ratio of δgap to δy . δy is the brace yielding
Fig. 1 shows the conceptual configuration of the dual-tube SC-BRB displacement, which corresponds to Fy . δgap is the brace activation
[9,13]. The system is composed of an energy dissipative system and a displacement when the force in the prestressed tendons equals the pre­
self-centering system. The inner and outer tubes work with the pre­ stressing force and a gap opens between the two axial tubes. Generally,
stressed tendons and end plates to constitute the self-centering system, δgap <δy , leading to a αδ < 1.
which is assembled in a way to ensure that any relative motion between δy depends on the physical properties of the core steel, including the
the inner tube and the outer tube always makes the prestressed tendons length LCO, yielding strength fCO and elastic modulus ECO. Once δy is
elongate further, no matter it is in compression or tension. Therefore, the known, δgap can be calculated with αδ :
prestressed tendons will always elongate and generate the restoring
force which is essential for the structural recentering. The energy δy = LCO
fCO
(1)
dissipative system mainly includes two parallel core steel plates, which ECO
dissipate energy through axial yielding in both tension and compression.
The compressive buckling of the core steel is restrained by the inner and δgap = αδ δy (2)
outer tubes. The failure of the two axial tubes, end plates and connecting The prestressing force, Fpre , and the yielding force for the core steel,
end should be avoided, and they should be capacity protected. More Fyc , can be expressed in the form of the selected IHPs:
information on the brace mechanism, physical configuration and
experimental verification can be found in Refs. [9,11–15]. Fpre =
(1 + αF )Fy
(3)
2

2.2. Selection of hysteretic parameters (1-αF )Fy

(4)
Fyc =
2
Fig. 2 presents the force–deformation hysteretic relationship of the APT and ACO are the area of prestressed tendons and core steel,
dual-tube SC-BRB [9,13]. The dotted line represents the hysteretic curve respectively. And can be calculated as:
of SC-BRB after the first loop, which is different from the first loop
because of the yielding of the energy dissipative core steel. For APT =
Fpre
(5)
simplicity, the kinematic and isotropic hardening of the core steel are εPT EPT
not included in Fig. 2, but they will be taken into consideration in the
Fyc
numerical investigation of this study to better reflect likely field ACO = (6)
fCO
behavior [27]. Four independent hysteretic parameters (IHPs) are
selected from the flag-shaped hysteresis of the SC-BRB, namely Fy , δfrac , where εPT is the prestressed strain, EPT is the elastic modulus of pre­
αF , and αδ , as shown in Fig. 2. Fy is the brace yielding strength when the stressed tendons, Fyc is the core steel yielding force.
core steel yields. δfrac is the brace deformation when the tendon frac­ Stiffnesses of SC-BRB at different stages, k1 , k2 and k3 , can be
tures, which can be designed by its corresponding story drift, indicated

3
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

Fig. 3. Example building layout and load information.

Table 1
Brace strength Fy , beams and columns.
Story Fy (kN) Beams Columns

Lateral resisting Gravity beams Lateral resisting Gravity columns

braced frame braced frame

Section Section Section Section

12 210 HW400 × 400 HW350 × 350 HW414 × 405 HW400 × 400

11 315 HW400 × 400 HW350 × 350 HW414 × 405 HW400 × 400
10 315 HW400 × 400 HW350 × 350 HW414 × 405 HW400 × 400
9 470 HW428 × 407 HW400 × 400 HW458 × 417 HW414 × 405
8 470 HW428 × 407 HW400 × 400 HW458 × 417 HW414 × 405
7 595 HW428 × 407 HW400 × 400 HW458 × 417 HW414 × 405
6 595 HW428 × 407 HW400 × 400 HW458 × 417 HW414 × 405
5 680 HW428 × 407 HW400 × 400 HW458 × 417 HW414 × 405
4 680 HW428 × 407 HW400 × 400 HW458 × 417 HW414 × 405
3 735 HW458 × 417 HW428 × 407 HW498 × 432 HW428 × 407
2 735 HW458 × 417 HW428 × 407 HW498 × 432 HW428 × 407
1 890 HW458 × 417 HW428 × 407 HW498 × 432 HW428 × 407

Note: HWa*b indicates the section size of I-beam, a and b are the height and width of the section, respectively. For example, HW350*350 stands for an I-beam with a
height of 350 mm and a width of 350 mm. Detailed information about selected I-beam are presented in Appendix A.2.

expressed by the four IHPs (Fy , αF , αδ and δfrac ) and five material and 3. 12-Story example building
geometric parameters (LCO, fCO, ECO, LPT, εPT,e ):
To establish the selection criterion for δfrac , αF and αδ , a 12-story steel
Fy ECO (1 + αF )
k1 = [ + (1-αF )] (7) braced frame office building was designed and simulated in OpenSees as
2LCO fCO αδ an example building.
(1 + αF )Fy Fy ECO (1-αF )
k2 = + (8) 3.1. Building design
2[LPT εPT,e -θfrac Hcos(θ)] 2LCO fCO

(1 + αF )Fy
k3 =
2[LPT εPT,e -θfrac Hcos(θ)]
where εPT,e is the tendon elastic strain capacity, LPT is the length of
prestressed tendons.
In summary, the properties of the SC-BRB are fully characterized by
the four IHPs. Among them, Fy can be obtained by current seismic design
procedures whereas the other parameters depend on proportions of
component properties of the core steel and the prestressed tendon.
Therefore, among the four IHPs in SC-BRB systems, Fy will be designed
by seismic demands, but δfrac , αF and αδ need to be selected by the
designer. Detailed derivations are presented in Appendix A.1.
The layout and gravity loading of the 12-story steel example building
(9) used in this study originated from the SAC steel benchmark building in
FEMA 355C [29]. Some modifications were made, including 1) the
penthouse was removed; 2) three stories were added to the original 9-
story building to better incorporate high-mode effect in the analyses;
3) a braced-frame lateral-resisting system was adopted; and 4) the roof
load and the floor load were assumed to be identical. Fig. 3 shows the
layout and load information of the example building. The example
building was assumed to be located at Suqian, Jiangsu province in
China. Thus, according to Chinese seismic design code [28], the seismic
intensity, the design basic seismic acceleration, the design seismic
grouping, the category of site and the characteristic period of the site
were assumed to be 8, 0.20 g, Group II, Class II and 0.4 s, respectively.

4
Y. Zhou et al.
F
F F
Fig. 4. Numerical model.
The maximum value of the code-based site acceleration spectrum is
1.04g, and the corresponding period range is 0.1 s to 0.4 s.
Direct displacement-based design (DDBD) procedure described in
Refs. [30,33] was used to determine the seismic design force and the
brace yielding strength Fy at each story. Currently, this no widely
adopted design criteria for SC-BRB frame. In this study, the design target
is set so that a BRB frame with the Fy has a drift response of 2 % under
maximum considered earthquake (MCE) earthquakes (this is confirmed
in Section 5.2). Alternatively, Fy can also be determined by force-based
method. Note that this study aims to append necessary recommenda­
tions on selecting hysteretic parameters, which are independent of Fy , so
the criteria that were established by this investigation can also be
applied to buildings designed by forced-based method. Once the seismic
design forces are determined, the combination of the seismic design
forces and the gravity loads were used to calculate the required strengths
of other structural components. Table 1 summarizes Fy , as well as the
sections of the I-beam selected for beams and columns in the example
building.
Braces. The braces’ yielding strength Fy was determined by seismic
demands from the DDBD procedure. Two types of SC-BRB were
considered in this study. The first one used pretensioned basalt fiber-
reinforced polymer (BFRP) composite tendons, as described in [13],
and was indicated as BFRP-SC-BRB. The BFRP tendon has a linear elastic
stress–strain relationship with a cyclic modulus of 48GPa and an elastic
ultimate strength of 1150 MPa. The other SC-BRB considered in this
study used pretensioned superplastic NiTi shape memory alloy (SMA)
rods, as described in [11], and was indicated as SMA-SC-BRB. The lower
plateau strength, upper plateau strength, elastic modulus and maximum
strain of the SMA material considered were reported as 224 MPa,
320 MPa, 58 GPa and 6.48 %, respectively [8]. Differing from the BFRP-
SC-BRBs, the SMA rods in a SC-BRB are not required to run the full
length between the anchorage plates due to their high strain capacity. A
general practice is to combine the SMA rods with steel threaded tendons
in series so that the amount of SMA is limited while providing sufficient
elongation capacity. Eatherton et al [12] suggested that the SMA rod
length be selected based on the objective to limit the SMA strain to 5 %
at a brace deformation of four times the design deformation, which was
adopted in this paper. Q235 steel [13] with an expected yielding
strength of 288 MPa and an elastic modulus of 206 GPa [31] was
assumed for the steel tendon that is series with the SMA rod. For both
5
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
types of SC-BRBs, the core yielding material of their BRB component was
also assumed to adopt Q235 steel. It should be noted that the Fy for each
designed system was equal to those in Table 1 regardless of tendon
materials and the selections of δfrac , αF and αδ , in order to achieve a
consistent comparison.
Beams/Columns. The beams and columns were grouped into two
categories, including the beams/columns in the lateral resisting braced
frames and gravity beams/columns. The vertical gravity load and the
seismic design force at design deformations were combined to design the
beams/columns in the lateral resisting braced frames. The gravity
beams/columns were designed under the combination of dead load and
live load. The section of beams and columns are selected based on the
Chinese code [32].
Joints. Two types of joints, namely gusset plates and shear tab con­
nections, were used in this building. Gusset plates were used for the
beam-column joints and beam mid-span points where braces are con­
nected. Shear tab connections were used for the beam-column joints
where no brace is connected. The joints were designed according to
Standard for design of steel structures [35].
3.2. Numerical modelling
3.2.1. Frame
Because the structure was symmetrical with negligible torsion effect,
the analyses of this study were performed on one quadrant of the
structure. A two-dimensional numerical model was developed for the
example building equipped with SC-BRBs in OpenSees [36]. The
modeling methodology refers to Ref. [37–38], which had been validated
by experiments [39], as shown in Fig. 4.
Force-based, beam-column fiber elements with five integration
points were used to model beams and columns. Elastic material, which
was set to have a quite large stiffness, was used to model the gusset plate
joints as rigid end zones. The other joints were all designed as pin shear
tab joints to reduce their likelihood of damage. However, in practice, the
shear tab joints had some rotational stiffnesses [40]. Considering their
large quantities, the total effect of shear tab joints cannot be neglected.
Thus, the Pinching4 material, which was suggested by Liu et al [40], was
used to model shear tab joints.
A leaning column was used to simulate the gravity column. At each
side of the leaning column, a beam was connected to the column by
Pinching4 nonlinear rotational joints. Therefore, the gravity frame P-
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 5. The simulation method of SC-BRB: (a) BFRP-SC-BRB; (b) SMA-SC-BRB.
Delta effect and the moment-resisting capacity were included. The
length of beams in the gravity frame equals the distance between the
shear tab and their inflection points. The section properties of the beam-
column elements were set as the value for a single gravity beam/column
(Table 1) multiplied by the number of gravity beams/columns.
Regarding the damping model, lots of research [41–46] has proved that
the most-commonly used Rayleigh damping may cause spurious
damping forces during regimes of inelastic response, and some of them
recommended Rayleigh damping using tangent stiffness. However,
Chopra and McKenna [43] pointed out that Rayleigh damping using
tangent stiffness matrix lacks a physical basis and has conceptual im­
plications. Furthermore, they proved a damping matrix constructed by
superposition of modal damping matrices, i.e. Modal damping, elimi­
nates the spurious damping forces completely and recommended this
damping model for nonlinear response history analysis of buildings.
Therefore, this paper adopts Modal damping model, and 3 % damping
ratio was assumed for the steel example building.
6
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
3.2.2. SC-BRB
As introduced in Section 3.1, two types of SC-BRB, i.e. BFRP-SC-BRB
and SMA-SC-BRB, were considered in this study. Fig. 5 shows the overall
procedure of modeling the SC-BRB in OpenSees, in which the SC-BRB’s
characteristics are integrated into a material object and then can be
assigned to element objects. As is shown, the property of the SC-BRB is a
parallel combination of the BRB and the self-centering system. For the
simulation of BRB, the Steel4 material in OpenSees was adopted, which
considered the kinematic and isotropic hardening. Parameters of Steel4
material referred to those in Ref. [27]. The simulation of the self-
centering system depended on the specific tendon materials that were
used.
The BFRP-SC-BRB uses the BFRP tendon described in Ref [13]. As
introduced in Section 3.1, the BFRP material shows a linear elastic
stress–strain relationship with a cyclic modulus of 48GPa and an elastic
ultimate strength of 1150 MPa. The force–deformation relationship for
the self-centering system in the BFRP-SC-BRB is fully characterized by
Fig. 2, where it behaves in a bilinear manner. Therefore, the ElasticBilin
material in OpenSees was adopted to simulate the self-centering system
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 6. Comparison of SC-BRB simulation and experiment results: (a) BFRP-SC-BRB; and (b) SMA-SC-BRB.
for BFRP-SC-BRBs, as shown in Fig. 5(a).
The numerical modeling procedure of SMA-SC-BRBs is illustrated in
Fig. 5(b). The SMA-steel prestressed tendon is not linear, so the simple
simulating method for the BFRP-SC-BRB is no longer feasible for simu­
lating the SMA-SC-BRB. The simulation procedure of the SMA-SC-BRB is
as follows (Fig. 5(b)): 1) First, use the SelfCentering material to simulate
the property of SMA; 2) Then, combine the SMA and a Steel01 material,
which defines the steel threaded tendon, in series to simulate the
property of the prestressing tendon. The length ratio of the two com­
ponents is determined by the criterion described in Section 3.1 [12]; 3)
Finally, combine the prestressing tendon with an ElasticBilin material,
which defines the tubes stiffness contribution before the gap opens, in
parallel to simulate the property of the self-centering system in the SMA-
SC-BRB.
To verify the simulation method, the simulated curves by the pro­
posed modeling method for the BFRP-SC-BRB and SMA-SC-BRB were
compared with those from the test results from Ref. [13] and [9],
respectively, as shown in Fig. 6. The simulated results were plotted on
top of the experimental figures with proper axis scaling. The simulation
curves agree well with the experimental curves, indicating that the
simulation method can accurately simulate the hysteretic performances
of both types of SC-BRBs.
3.3. Ground motion
The set of far-field ground motion selected by Haselton et al. [34]
was used for the earthquake analyses. This ground-motion set includes
39 records (78 individual components), of which 22 records were
adopted in FEMA P695 [47] far-field record set, and had been widely
used in evaluating building seismic performances [4,48]. Each ground
motion was scaled by a single scale factor that would minimize the mean
squared error of the median spectral acceleration of the ground-motion
set compared to the MCE spectrum over a period range from 0.2 T1 to
2 T1, where T1 is the structural fundamental period [49]. Additionally,
each analysis added 5-second free vibration at the end of ground mo­
tions so that the results of the residual drift can be more accurate.
4. Effects of hysteresis parameters on component property
demand and performance
As stated above, the SC-BRB system is determined once the four IHPs
are selected. However, current seismic design procedures can only
determine Fy , and no suggested values are given for the other three IHPs
(δfrac , αF and αδ ). To propose design recommendations for these three
IHPs, a series of numerical analyses with varying IHPs were performed
based on the example building. The effects of different values of each
7
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
IHP can be divided into two aspects: component property demand and
seismic performance.
Component property demand. The demand on component properties
measures the difficultness and the initial cost to construct braced-frame
system. Analyses of structural performances without considering
component property demands can be physically meaningless. Because
braces are the main variable in this study, their component properties
are relatively detailed calculated, including the prestressing force Fpre ,
the prestressed tendon area APT and the core steel area ACO, which can
be determined by Eqn (3), Eqn (5) and Eqn (6), respectively. As shown in
Table 1, in this study, the frame component dimensions were assumed
consistent for compared systems, so that the variances in seismic per­
formance were totally caused by the selected parameters. Nevertheless,
the normalized maximum brace force Fm /Fy response can serve as an
indirect indicator for the demand on frame component properties,
because a large Fm /Fy implies the frame is supposed to be stronger in the
capacity design process. Meanwhile, Fm /Fy can also be used to evaluate
seismic performance as described in the next bullet.
Seismic performances. Seismic performances can be measured by the
maximum transient story drift θm , the residual story drift θr , the damage
concentration factor (DCF), the normalized peak absolute acceleration
af,m /ag,m , the normalized maximum brace force Fm /Fy and the tendon
fracture probability (TFP). The DCF, which equals to the ratio of the
maximum θm of all stories to the maximum overall roof drift [50], is an
indicator to evaluate the structural systems’ ability to mitigate soft story
response. The af,m /ag,m works as an acceleration indicator, where ag,m is
the maximum ground acceleration and af,m is the maximum floor ab­
solute acceleration. The TFP is calculated as the percentage of the ana­
lyses that have a brace deformation exceeding δfrac . Note in future
investigations, these seismic performance indicators can also be trans­
ferred to repair cost quantities [51–52].
4.1. Parametric study for BFRP-SC-BRB system
This section aims to investigate the influence of the varying IHPs on
the BFRP-SC-BRB system. Fy was determined in the building design
process (Table 1). The initial values of δfrac , αF and αδ for the benchmark
model were obtained from literatures, resulting in a δfrac corresponding
to 3.00 % story drift, a αF = 0.22 and a αδ = 0.12 [11,28]. Then, systems
were designed and numerical analyses were conducted with each IHP
varied within a certain interval while keeping the other two unchanged.
The coupling effect of the three parameters was not considered in this
study, which requires further research.
4.1.1. Effect of θfrac (δfrac )
Eight BFRP-SC-BRB systems were designed with various values of
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 7. Comparison results of BFRP-SC-BRB systems with various θfrac (δfrac ).
θfrac (δfrac ) (see Fig. 2), then their component property demands and
seismic performances were compared, as shown in Fig. 7. The αF and αδ
were the same as for the benchmark design. The component properties,
Fpre , APT and ACO , of all braces were displayed in their average values,
and the seismic performances, Fm /Fy , θm , θr , af,m /ag,m , DCF and TFP, of
all stories were displayed in their maximum values. The results shown in
Fig. 7 were obtained using the 78 motions for each designed system.
Nevertheless, only the median (50 %) and 84 % values of the seismic
performances under the 78 motions are presented. The 84 % value
represents a performance level that 16 % of the records (13 out of 78)
would exceed. In Fig. 7 ~ 12, the height of the bars stands for the median
values and the error bars indicate the 84 % values.
Fig. 7 shows that, the demands of component property (APT , Fm /Fy )
increase with the increase of designed θfrac . This is because the initial
strains (εPT ) of prestressed tendons need to be smaller with the increased
design θfrac (Eqn (A.6)). Meanwhile, the prestressing force Fpre , which is
controlled by αF , is unchanged. Thus, as θfrac increases, the strain and
stress in the prestressed tendons decrease and the prestressed tendon
area, APT , must increase to keep Fpre unchanged. The postyielding
stiffness increases due to the change of APT , and leads to larger Fm /Fy . On
the other hand, TFP dramatically decreases with the increase of θfrac ,
whereas the other performance indicators show only minor variation.
Thus, the selection of θfrac is a balance between component property
demands and TFP. A value of 3.00 % is recommended, as it has a small
TFP (=9%) that should be accepted in practice.
To propose a more general design recommendation, the suggested
θfrac value is supposed to be further normalized by the θm demand. This
is because the TFP plays an important role in selecting θfrac , and it is
8
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
highly related to the drift response, i.e θm demand. As Fig. 7 shows, the
median value of θm response under MCE motions is insensitive to the
choice of θfrac and is about 2.26 % for each system. Thus, the θfrac is
recommended to be 1.3 (=3.00 %/2.26 %) times the median θm
response under MCE motions. Take advantage of this feature, it is
possible to estimate θfrac (δfrac ) by obtaining θm with an elastic calcu­
lating method adjusted by an elastoplastic deformation factor in seismic
codes, such as ASCE 7 [53].
4.1.2. Effect of αF
The comparison results of eight BFRP-SC-BRB system designed with
various values of αF (defined as Fclose /Fy ) are shown in Fig. 8. The δfrac
and αδ were the same as for the benchmark design, and were corre­
sponding to 3.00 % story drift and 0.12, respectively. Fig. 8 shows that
component property demands (Fpre , APT , Fm /Fy ), maximum transient
drift, acceleration response (θm and af,m /ag,m ) and TFP increase, whereas
ACO decreases, with the increase of designed αF . Because αF controls the
value of Fpre (Eqn (3) and Fig. 2), a large αF leads to a large Fpre , which
means more prestressed tendons (APT ) are needed in the BFRP-SC-BRB.
Thus, the postyielding stiffness is increased at the same time and leads to
slightly increased Fm /Fy . There, APT represents the area of BFRP and ACO
is the core steel area of BRB. BFRP is likely to be more expensive than the
core steel. Therefore, it is fair to say construction difficulties and cost
undoubtably increase for a larger αF . According to Fig. 2, the increase of
designed αF also reduces the energy dissipated capacity of the SC-BRB,
which results in the larger θm , af,m /ag,m and TFP responses.
The measurements of the above indicators support selecting of a low
value of αF in design. However, the residual drift response (θr ) does show
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 8. Comparison results of BFRP-SC-BRB systems with various αF .
an opposite trend, as it tends to increase with the decrease of αF . This is
because a large αF implies that the self-centering system is able to sur­
mount the resistance of the hysteretic component (i.e. BRB) during
unloading, and thereby θr can be smaller. If αF is negative, the re-
centering forces can never pull the system back to its original positive,
not to mention the strain hardening of the BRB, which leads to residual
drifts even under small loadings.
To conclude, the selection of αF is a balance between residual drift
(θr ) and other performance indicators. Theoretically, αF needs be larger
than zero to avoid residual drifts under small loadings. Fig. 8 shows that
αF = 0.02 effectively limits both θm , af,m /ag,m and θr responses with
reasonable component property demands, so it is recommended to be
the suggested value.
4.1.3. Effect of αδ
The comparison results of eight BFRP-SC-BRB system designed with
various values of αδ (defined as δgap /δy ) are shown in Fig. 9. The values
δfrac and αF corresponded to 3.00 % story drift and equaled to 0.22,
respectively, as were identical to the benchmark model.
Overall, the selected value of αδ has minor effect on all the perfor­
mance indicators except for the peak floor acceleration response
(af,m /ag,m ). Eqn (1) indicates that the yielding deformation δy only relies
on material and geometric properties, so the decrease of αδ will inevi­
tably decrease δgap (=αδ δy ). Consequently, the initial stiffness k1 in­
creases (Fig. 2) and leads to large af,m /ag,m . Therefore, the parametric
study results imply that a large level of αδ should be selected in design.
In actual manufacture of the SC-BRBs, the target αδ may not be
9
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
achieved, because it is highly related to the first stiffness of the self-
centering system, kSC1, as shown in Eqn (A.3). kSC1 consists of the stiff­
ness of the prestressed tendons and the stiffnesses from axial tubes
before the gap opens. However, many researchers have reported that the
stiffnesses from axial tubes before the gap opens has large uncertainties
caused by manufacturing imperfections in the length of the axial tubes
[3,15,54]. The larger the manufacturing imperfections, the smaller kSC1,
which indicates larger αδ (Eqn (A.3)). Because it is difficult to accurately
estimate the manufacturing imperfections, the level of αδ remains un­
known. Note that the parametric study results shown in Fig. 9 indicate
that a relatively large αδ actually helps to improve the structural per­
formance, especially in the aspect of af,m /ag,m response. Therefore, some
manufacturing imperfections are allowed in manufacturing SC-BRBs.
4.2. Parametric study for SMA-SC-BRB system
Similar parametric studies were conducted for the SMA-SC-BRB
system. Among the four IHPs (Fy , δfrac , αδ and αF ), Fy has been
designed and shown in Table 1, but δfrac , αδ and αF need to be selected.
To facilitate the comparison of the two systems, the values of three IHPs
of the benchmark model in Section 4.1 were again taken as the initial
values of SMA-SC-BRB system, as δfrac corresponding to 3.00 % story
drift, αF =0.22 and αδ = 0.12.
4.2.1. Effect of θfrac (δfrac )
The comparison results of eight SMA-SC-BRB system designed with
various values of θfrac (δfrac ) are shown in Fig. 10. The αF and αδ were the
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 9. Comparison results of BFRP-SC-BRB systems with various αδ .
same with the benchmark design and were equal to 0.22 and 0.12,
respectively. Fig. 10 shows that, with the increase of designed θfrac , the
increase in component property demands (APT , Fm /Fy ) are not as sig­
nificant as the BFRP-SC-BRB system because the SMA has larger strain
capacity. Besides, TFP dramatically decreases with the increase of θfrac .
Compared to other design choices, a θfrac equals 3.00 % story drift
leading to TFP smaller than 10 %, so it is suggested in this example
building, which is the same as the suggestion for the BFRP-SC-BRB
system.
Similar with the suggestion for BFRP-SC-BRB systems, the suggested
θfrac value was further normalized by the θm response. As shown in
Fig. 10, the median θm response is around 2.25 % for the eight designed
systems. Thus, the θfrac is recommended to be 1.3 (=3.00 %/2.25 %)
times the median θm response under MCE motions.
4.2.2. Effect of αF
The comparison results of eight SMA-SC-BRB system designed with
various values of αF are shown in Fig. 11. The δfrac and αδ were the same
with the benchmark design, and corresponded to 3.00 % story drift and
equaled to 0.12, respectively. Fig. 11 shows that Fpre , APT , Fm /Fy , TFP, θm
and af,m /ag,m increase, whereas ACO and θr decrease, with the increase of
designed αF . This trend of these indicators is similar to that of the BFRP-
SC-BRB system (Fig. 8), for the same mechanism, though the variance of
θr response under the MCE motions is not considerable for the SMA-SC-
BRB system. Therefore, the change of the prestressing element material
does not considerably affect the selection of αF . Similar with the case in
BFRP-SC-BRB, it is shown in Fig. 2 that the system will have unavoidable
θr with a negative αF , even under small earthquakes. Therefore, a αF of
10
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
0.02 is suggested to minimize component property demands, while
effectively controlling residual drifts.
4.2.3. Effect of αδ
The comparison results of eight SMA-SC-BRB system designed with
various values of αδ are shown in Fig. 12. The values of δfrac and αF
corresponded to 3.00 % story drift and equaled to 0.22, respectively.
Same to the BFRP-SC-BRB system, the increase of designed αδ in SMA-
SC-BRB system decreases the normalized peak absolute acceleration
(af,m /ag,m ), because of the larger initial stiffness. The increase of
designed αδ does not cause changes in Fpre , APT and ACO , nor does it
cause a significant difference in Fm /Fy , TFP, θm , θr and DCF. Therefore, it
is preferred to design the system with large value of αδ . However, as
discussed in section 4.1.3, it is difficult to get the target value of αδ in
actual manufacture of the SC-BRBs. Considering the acceleration re­
sponses (af,m /ag,m ), some manufacturing imperfections should be
allowed.
5. Comparison between sc-brb and comparable systems
5.1. Methodology
Five braced frame systems were compared using the 12-story
example building in this section, including a conventional BRB frame,
a BFRP-SC-BRB frame, a SMA-SC-BRB frame, a conventional self-
centering energy dissipative (C-SCED) braced frame [6] and a tele­
scoping self-centering energy dissipative (T-SCED) braced frame [7].
The C-SCED and T-SCED braces also have flag-shaped force–deformation
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 10. Comparison results of SMA-SC-BRB systems with various θfrac (δfrac ).
hystereses. A C-SCED system includes two axial tubes, a fiber-reinforced
polymer prestressed tendon system, a friction damper and an external
friction fuse. The T-SCED brace is similar with the C-SCED system but
does not include the external fuse. Instead, it has an additional axial
component and two sets of prestressed tendons that share the brace
deformation. Consequently, the T-SCED brace can achieve larger de­
formations than the C-SCED system. In this study, the BFRP described in
[13] is assumed for the C- and T-SCED braces, so that the PT material of
the SCED braces and BFRP-SC-BRB are consistent. More information on
the two SCED braces, including mechanism and test verification, can be
found in [6,7,54].
The material properties of the prestressing element and core steel for
the five brace systems are summarized in Table 2. The properties for
BFRP-SC-BRB and SMA-SC-BRB are the same as those described in
Section 3.1. Note the tendon properties of the SMA-SC-BRB listed in this
table are those of the series combination of the SMA rod and steel
tendon. The BRB and SC-BRBs all adopt Q235 steel for their core steels,
but the C-SCED and T-SCED system rely on friction for energy dissipa­
tion, so their material properties do not include fCO and ECO.
The same brace yielding strength was assigned to each of the five
systems (Table 1). The property of the BRB system was then fully
characterized. For the BFRP-SC-BRB and SMA-SC-BRB system, the sug­
gested values of θfrac and αF proposed in Section 4 were adopted, as
equaled to 3.00 % and 0.02, respectively. The value of αδ has large un­
certainties and it does not affect the component properties of the SC-BRB
system. In this section, a αδ = 0.62 is assumed which limits the accel­
eration response (Figs. 9 and 12). For the two SCED systems, Xiao et al.
[4] proposed criteria for selecting their properties, which are adopted in
this paper. The two parameters defined for proportioning the T-SCED
system include θfrac and αF that are similar to those in the SC-BRB sys­
tem, but the set of parameters defined for proportioning the C-SCED
11
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
system replace θfrac by two new parameters, indicated as θfuse and λδ .
This is because the C-SCED system incorporates an external fuse to
protect its prestressed tendons. Accordingly, θfuse is defined by the story
drift when the fuse activates and λδ is defined by θfrac /θfuse . The selected
parameters and material properties are summaries in Table 2.
The frame and the two SC-BRBs were simulated using the same
modeling method described in Section 3.2. The BRB and the two SCED
braces were simulated using steel4 material [27] and SelfCentering
material [55] in OpenSees, respectively, which were developed specif­
ically for these types of braces.
The structural fundamental periods obtained from the numerical
model were 2.40 s, 2.23 s, 2.23 s, 2.01 s and 2.01 s, respectively, for the
BRB, BFRP-SC-BRB, SMA-SC-BRB, C-SCED and T-SCED braced frame
systems. Nonlinear response history analyses were performed for each of
the five systems, using the same set of scaled ground motion in Section
3.3. Similar with the SC-BRBs, the tendon fracture probability (TFP) of
the T-SCED system is calculated by percentage of the analyses that had a
brace deformation exceeding δfrac . The TFP of the C-SCED system needs
to consider the brace property uncertainties, otherwise the fuse would
always protect the tendons. The simplified procedure proposed by Xiao
et al. [4] was adopted in this study to calculate the TFP of the C-SCED
system, which is assumed to be a product of the probability of the fuse
not activating before tendons fracture and the probability of the analyses
that had a brace deformation exceeding δfrac .
5.2. Comparison of component property demands and seismic
performances
Fig. 13 presents component property demands and seismic perfor­
mances of the five systems, in which “BFRP-” indicates the BFRP-SC-BRB
system and “SMA-” indicates the SMA-SC-BRB system. Fd is the yielding
Y. Zhou et al.
Fig. 11. Comparison results of SMA-SC-BRB systems with various αF .
force of the energy dissipative system. For BRB and SC-BRBs, Fd equals
the yielding forces of the core steel (Fyc), whereas for the two SCED
systems, Fd equals the activation force of the internal friction damper.
The C-SCED system has an external friction fuse that contributes to
component property demands, so a fuse activation force, Ffuse, is also
included in the up-left subfigure of Fig. 13. The other indicators are the
same to those in Fig. 7 ~ 12.
The SC-BRB and SCED systems had very similar Fpre and Fd, but there
were significant differences in APT because they adopt different sug­
gested factors (SC-BRB and SCED systems) and prestressing tendons
(BFRP and SMA), not to mention that the T-SCED brace has an additional
set of tendons. The BFRP-SC-BRB system leads to larger Fm /Fy than the
other systems, because it has large postyielding stiffness, as well as cu­
mulative strain hardening of the core steel, as shown in Fig. 14. This
figure illustrates the hystereses of the five types of braces in the first floor
of the 12-story building (Fig. 3).
Although the BRB system has smaller stiffness than the self-centering
systems (Fig. 4), it still can achieve relatively small maximum transient
drift (θm ) response because of its large energy dissipative capacity. The
two SCED systems have larger θm responses than BRB, but smaller θm
and DCF than the two SC-BRB systems. Fig. 15(a)~(e) plot the θm re­
sponses along the building height for each of the five stories. The indi­
vidual analysis result, median value and 84 % value are shown in gray,
red and black, respectively. The SC-BRB systems appeared to have the
most significant high-mode effect that increases the drift responses on
top stories. This phenomenon is consistent with the investigation of Qiu
and Zhu [56], who proposed that the high-mode effect is more
12
Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019
significant in self-centering braced frames than in BRB frames and a
large postyielding stiffness helps to limit the high-mode effect. Accord­
ingly, the SMA-SC-BRB system had a more severe high mode effect than
the BFRP-SC-BRB, because it had smaller postyielding stiffness (Fig. 14).
The relationship between the postyielding stiffness and high-mode ef­
fects in the SCED systems followed the same principle. The difference
between the SC-BRB and SCED systems might lie in their hysteretic
difference and further research is needed.
The BRB system resulted in significant residual drift (θr ) responses
that were larger than 0.5 %, indicating that the repair cost might be
more expensive than the reconstruction cost of the building [57]. As
expected, the SCED and SC-BRB systems all had smaller θr . Among these
self-centering systems, the residual drift responses of SC-BRBs were
much larger than those obtained in the SCED systems. In contrast to the
SCED systems, the SC-BRB hystereses theoretically cannot eliminate
residual drift, as shown in Figs. 2 and 14, the. The strain hardening of the
core steel and the larger maximum transient drift response (θm ) further
increases the θr responses in SC-BRB systems.
All the four self-centering brace systems have more significant ac­
celeration responses than the BRB system, which is consistent with past
investigations [4,56]. Their TFP appeared to be very close to zero under
the 78 MCE motions.
6. Summary and conclusions
In this study, the effects of design parameters on the overall perfor­
mances of self-centering buckling-restrained brace (SC-BRB) frames
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

Fig. 12. Comparison results of SMA-SC-BRB systems with various αδ .

Table 2
Selected parameter and material property of the five systems.
Brace frame system Selected parameter Material property

αF θfrac αδ θfuse λδ fPT EPT fCO ECO

/MPa /GPa /MPa /GPa

BRB – – – – – – 288 206

BFRP-SC-BRB 0.02 3.00 % 0.62 – – 1150 48 288 206
SMA-SC-BRB 0.02 3.00 % 0.62 – – 288 100 288 206
C-SCED 0.03 – – 2.76 % 1.15 1150 48 – –
T-SCED 0.03 6.38 % – – – 1150 48 – –

were investigated by parametric studies. Then, criteria for selecting the
key design parameters were proposed, including those for: 1) the brace
deformation when the tendon fractures, δfrac ; 2) the ratio of the brace
force at which the gap between axial components closes during
unloading, Fclose , to the yielding strength, Fy , denoted as αF ; and 3) the
ratio of the activation displacement of the self-centering system, δgap , to
the yielding displacement of the core steel, δy , denoted as αδ . These three
parameters, together with Fy , determine the system force–deformation
hysteresis (Fig. 2).
For the SC-BRB that uses pretensioned basalt fiber-reinforced poly­
mer (BFRP) tendons, denoted as BFRP-SC-BRB, and the SC-BRB that uses
pretensioned superplastic NiTi shape memory alloy (SMA) rods, denoted
as SMA-SC-BRB, parametric study results show:
• δfrac . Component property demands (APT , Fm /Fy ) increase, whereas
the tendon fracture probability (TFP) decreases significantly, with
the increase of designed δfrac (Figs. 7 and 10). Thus, the selection of
δfrac requires tradeoffs between component property demands and
TFP. To achieve sufficiently small TFP (say < 10 %) under MCE mo­
tions with reasonable demands of component properties, this paper
suggests the corresponding drift, θfrac , of δfrac to be selected as 1.3
multiplies the median maximum transient drift (θm ) response for all
stories under MCE motions, for both SC-BRB systems. The median θm
response can be assessed by the product of a drift response obtained
from elastic analyses and an elastoplastic deformation amplification
factor specified in codes. For structures or ground-motions that have
significant different characteristics compared with this study, the
suggested factor of 1.3 may not be reliable but it can be used in the
preliminary design;
• αF . A large αF (defined as Fclose /Fy ) increases component property
demands (Fpre , APT , Fm /Fy ), maximum transient drift and accelera­
tion response (θm and af,m /ag,m ) (Figs. 8 and 11). But if αF is smaller
than 0, the system may have significant residual drift even under
small loadings. Thus, a αF = 0.02 is suggested for both systems.
• αδ . Generally, αδ (defined as δgap /δy ) is smaller than 1.0, so that the
gap of the self-centering system opens before the core plate yields.
The selection of a large αδ has minor effect on almost all the per­
formance indicators, except that it significantly reduces the
normalized peak absolute acceleration (af,m /ag,m ) (Figs. 9 and 12).
The actual value of αδ appears to depend on the first stiffness of the
self-centering system before the gap opens, which has large un­
certainties, so that any target αδ might not be achieved in practice.

13
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

Fig. 13. The component property demands and seismic performances of five systems.

Fig. 14. The hysteresis of five braces on the first floor: (a) BRB; (b) BFRP-SC-BRB; (c) SMA-SC-BRB; (d) C-SCED; (e) T-SCED.

14
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

Fig. 15. θm response of all stories: (a) BRB; (b) BFRP-SC-BRB; (c) SMA-SC-BRB; (d) C-SCED; (e) T-SCED.

This investigation of the αδ ’s effect implies that some manufacturing Supervision, Validation, Writing – review & editing.
imperfections (increases αδ ) are favorable to the system’s overall
performances. Declaration of Competing Interest

The behaviors of the two SC-BRB systems were then compared with a The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
BRB system and two self-centering energy dissipative (SCED) braced interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
frame systems. The self-centering systems were designed with suggested the work reported in this paper.
parameters. It is found that the SC-BRB systems had larger θm and DCF
responses than the BRB and SCED systems, which is attributed to their Data availability
more significant high-mode effect that increases the drift responses on
top stories. The SC-BRBs successfully controlled θr responses to Data will be made available on request.
be<0.5 %, but the levels of θr in SC-BRB systems were larger than those
in SCED systems. Acknowledgments

CRediT authorship contribution statement The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the
National Natural Science Foundation Project (Grant No. 52208501,
Ying Zhou: Conceptualization, Resources, Methodology. Wenbo 52025083) and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Grant
Tian: Formal analysis, Investigation, Writing – original draft. Yi Xiao: 2022M712424).

Appendix

A.1 The derivation process of the SC-BRB system

The relationship between Fy with the prestressing force, Fpre , and core steel yielding force, Fyc , is:
( )
Fy = Fpre + kSC2 δy − δgap + Fyc ≈ Fpre + Fyc (A1)

( )
where kSC2 is the second stiffness of the self-centering system. Because both δy − δgap and kSC2 are intended to be small, kSC2 δy − δgap will be much
smaller than Fpre and Fyc , so it is neglected in Eqn (A.1).
When the brace deformation is unloaded to δgap , the force in the prestressed tendons returns to Fpre and the force of BRB is -Fyc , as it is yielding in
the opposite direction (see Fig. 1(b)). At this moment, the gap between the inner and outer tubes closes, the corresponding brace force, Fclose is:

15
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

Fclose = Fpre − Fyc (A2)

By combining Eqn (A.1) and (A.2), and note that αF = Fclose /Fy , Fpre and Fyc can be expressed as Eqn (3) and (4).
From Fig. 1(b), the first stiffness of the self-centering system, kSC1 , and the first stiffness of the BRB, kCO1 :
(1 + αF )Fy (1 + αF )Fy
kSC1 = = (A3)
2δgap 2αδ δy

(1-αF )Fy
kCO1 = (A4)
2δy

αδ = δgap /δy
After the gap opens, the second stiffness of the self-centering system, kSC2 , is provided by the prestressed tendons only:
APT EPT
kSC2 = (A5)
LPT
εPT in Eqn (5) can be calculated by Eqn (A.6):
δfrac
εPT = εPT,e − (A6)
LPT

fPT
εPT,e = (A7)
EPT

where fPT is the strength of prestressed tendons.

Substitute Eqn (3), (5), (A.6) and (A.7) to Eqn (A.5) gives Eqn (A.8):
(1 + αF )Fy
2 (A8)
kSC2 =
FPT εPT,e − δfrac

Finally, k1 , k2 and k3 can be expressed by the four IHPs (Fy , αF , αδ and δfrac ) and five material and geometric parameters (LCO, fCO, ECO, LPT, fPT and
EPT):
Fy ECO (1 + αF )
k1 = kSC1 + kCO1 = [ + (1-αF )] (A9)
2LCO fCO αδ

(1 + αF )Fy Fy ECO (1-αF )

k2 = kSC2 + kCO1 = + (A10)
2[LPT εPT,e -θfrac Hcos(θ)] 2LCO fCO

(1 + αF )Fy
k3 = kSC2 + kCO2 ≈ kSC2 = (A11)
2[LPT εPT,e -θfrac Hcos(θ)]

A.2 Section information of I-beam

(See Fig. A1 and Table A1).

Fig. A1. The configuration of I-beam.

16
Y. Zhou et al. Engineering Structures 273 (2022) 115019

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