Seismic Collapsing Process Analysis of One-story Thatched Roof Wooden Structure under Strong Earthquake Ground Motion

Abstract

In Japan, there has existed a serious problem on seismic retrofit for a lot of one-story wooden structures such as temples and shrines in famous tourist resort areas, which were built by a Japanese traditional framed-construction method and have some types of thatched roof instead of tiles. In order to investigate the seismic behaviour of an old one-story thatched roof wooden structure, "Yakushi-doh", 3-D non-linear collapsing process analysis of Yakushi-doh structure was conducted against a strong earthquake ground motion with the Japan Meteorological Agency seismic intensity of "6 upper" level. A non-linear behaviour of timber elements in the wooden structure during a strong earthquake ground motion can be simulated by this 3-D non-linear collapsing process analysis based on the Distinct Element Method. The effect of the post fixing condition under wooden structure floor on seismic response of Yakushi-doh structure was numerically investigated in this paper.