Journal of Civil Engineering Technology and Research

Volume 2, Number 1 (2014), pp.393-401

© Delton Books
http://www.deltonbooks.com

Parametric Study on Rotation and Plastic Hinge

Formation in RC Beams
Atul Gopinath
Research scholar, Civil Engg. Dept,
M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology, Bangalore,

Nambiyanna B
Research scholar, Civil Engg. Dept,
M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology, Bangalore,

Dr Nakul R.
Professor (Lab Manager) University of Delaware, U S A,

Dr. Prabhakara R,
Prof & Head, Civil EnggDept,
M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology, Bangalore.

Abstract:
Rotation capacity in the critical sections of structural members is an important
property for the capacity to redistribute forces and for the prevention of
progressive structural collapse. The plastic hinge rotation has been fully
understood in steel structures with respect to its ductility however, determination
of plastic hinge rotations in RC structures are complicated than that of steel
structures. It has been observed from the literature that length of plastic hinge (lp)
in RC beams are influenced by several parameters. The length of the plastic hinge
zone (lp) is an important design parameter where intense confinement should be
provided to increase the ductility of the member for survival from extreme events
such as earthquakes.
Parametric study is carried out by collecting about 173 data from the literature
and influencing parameters on length of plastic hinge (lp) are tabulated
systematically. The influencing parameters such as geometrical dimensions of the
beams, grade of the concrete, tension reinforcement percentage, and span to
depth ratio on the ultimate deformation characteristics of RC beams. The length
of Plastic hinge was calculated based on existing analytical models and Proposed
analytical model. Determining of Plastic hinge length (lp) by experimentally is
quite complicated hence attempt was done to determine Plastic hinge length by
analytically.
In this study, the existing analytical models are re-examined and the effects of
different influencing parameters on Plastic hinge length are determined by
proposed analytical model Comparison is done between exiting analytical plastic
hinge models to the proposed analytical model and values are compared with the
values predicted by using these formulae. It is found from the investigation that
with increasing depth of beam then length of plastic hinge length (lp) is decreases
394 Atul Gopinath et al.

and as the increasing the percentage of tension reinforcement substantially

increases the moment capacity of the section but percentage of reinforcement has
no more effect on length of plastic hinge length.
Keyword: Beams, Parametric study, plastic hinge rotation, Plastic hinge length

Introduction:
In reinforced concrete structural members, plastic hinges are generally considered to as the
most severely damaged zone of the RC member undergoing large inelastic deformation. The
characteristics of plastic hinges have continued to keep the attention of both researchers and
engineers. Understanding the inelastic behavior, and the plastic hinge length is not only
crucial to the deformation capacity design of flexural RC members, but also critical to the
retrofit of existing RC structural member damaged by sever earthquakes. The large damages
in structural members occurred by strong earthquakes underscore the need for the study on
the behavior of plastic hinges in RC elements.

In RC structural members as the applied load is increased, the inelastic deformation induced
and inelastic plasticized zones are formed in succession at locations where the plastic
moment capacity is reached, with further increase in the applied load, these plasticized zones
are to rotate until the last hinge forms and converting the structure into a mechanism resulting
in to failure. The multi-storey framed structures are designed to achieve by selecting the
cross-sections of the columns and beams so that, the plastic hinges rotations formed in the
beams earlier than that of in the columns. If plastic hinges occurred in columns earlier
compared to beams then structure will collapse without giving any warning. For this reason
plastic hinge formation concept is important issue in Reinforced concrete structures.

This study is performed to indicate that determine the plastic hinge length and various
parameters that affect the length of plastic hinge such as, geometrical dimensions of the
beams, grade of the concrete, tension reinforcement percentage, span to depth ratio on the
ultimate deformation characteristics, support conditions and the magnitude and type of
loading. The main objective of this study is to propose an analytical model that can be used to
calculate the length of a plastic hinge (lp) by using parametric studies was done for the RC
beams. For this study, numbers of RC beams parameters were referred from the literature [3]-
[8].

Objectives:
The objectives of the study are:
Ø To know the nonlinear behaviour of RC members based upon literature studies, using
an analytical model developed to analyze the behaviour of the plastic hinge formation
in reinforced concrete members;
Ø To determine Plastic hinge length (lp) by experimentally is quite complicated hence
can be done analytically so more investigation on analytical models is required;
Ø The existing plastic hinge models are re-examined and the effects of different
parameters on length of Plastic hinge are determined by proposed analytical model.

Literature Review:
The available literatures on Rotation capacity and plastic hinge formation in RC beams
literatures were collected and systematically reviewed and are as follows.
Parametric Study on Rotation and Plastic Hinge Formation
Formation…. 395

HakanFransson (1997) [6] Carried out studies on rotation capacity of HSC beams with
compressive strength ranged from about 80 80-130MPa.Twenty
130MPa.Twenty one beams were casted and
three point bending tests on beams with different amount of tensile reinforcement and stirrups
were used. Three different sizes of beams were used and all beams were under under--reinforced.
The rotation capacity at a plastic hinge was calculated from the test results. It was concluded
that,, sparsely placed stirrups in a beam with spacing >0.8b have a favorable effect on
ductility of HSC beams.
Man-Young
Young Ko. et al., (2001) [8] Described an experimental study on the plastic rotation
capacity of reinforced high strength concrete (HSC) beams. T Thirty-six
six beams with various
compressive strengths of concrete, tensile reinforcement ratios, compressive reinforcement
ratios, and patterns of loading (1 point loading and 2 points loading) were tested to evaluate
the plastic rotation capacity.
S. M. R. Lopes and L. E. A. Bernardo (2003) [5] Investigated an experimental study on the
plastic rotation capacity of HSC. Nine simply supported beams were tested, by applying two
symmetrical concentrated loads at approximately one
one-third and two-third's
third's span. A method
me of
analysis was defined that leads to the development of a parameter that characterizes the
plastic rotation capacity at the failure section by means of a plastic analysis of the tested
beams.
Ali Kheyroddin and H. Naderpour (2007) [1] Studied to ass assess
ess the influence of the tension
reinforcement index, (ω = ρ fy /f’c) and the bending moment distribution (loading type) on the
ultimate deformation characteristics of reinforced concrete (RC) beams. The analytical results
for 15 simply supported beams with different amounts of tension reinforcement ratio under
three different
rent loading conditions were presented and compared with the predictions of the
various formulations and the experimental data.
Plastic Hinge Length
It is generally agreed that the inelastic rotations are concentrated over a length called "plastic
hinge length" where My<M < Mu. Plastic hinge length is dependent on the shape of the
bending moment diagram at the ultimate stage, and is also affected by the distance between
points of contra flexure, and distance between support, reinforcement ratio, the compressive
compre
strength of concrete and depth of section. The equivalent plastic hinge length can be
calculated based on integration of the curvature distribution for typical members.

Figure-1 Determination of Plastic hinge length lp based on Bending moment diagrams.

diagr
396 Atul Gopinath et al.

Existing Analytical Models:

The Analytical models available in literature for determining plastic hinge length are
tabulated in TABLE-1.
Table-1 Plastic Hinge Length Expressions (lp)

Researcher Reference Plastic Hinge Length

Baker (1956) k(z / d)1/4 d
Sawyer (1964) 0.25d + 0.075z
Corley (1966) 0.5d + 0.2 √ d (z / d)
Mattock (1967) 0.5d + 0.05z
Priestley and Park (1987) 0.08z + 6db
Paulay and Priestley (1992) 0.08z + 0.022db
Sheikh and Khoury (1993) 1.0h
c
Coleman and Spacone (2001) G f/[0.6f’c(ε 20- ε c+0.8 f’c/Ec)
Panagiotakos and Fardis (2001) 0.18z + 0.021db

The existing analytical models give a constant lp regardless of the important parameters
tabulated in TABLE-2. For instance, Sawyer, Corley and Mattock consider only length and
depth of the section shown in Table-1. Priestley & Park expressions the lp depends on length
and diameter of reinforcement of the beam.

Parametric Study
In this study, considering simply supported beams with central point loading configuration
and different equivalent length of beams were selected from literatures. Properties of
Material, width and depth of beams, tension steel percentages and all other influencing
parameters that affecting the beam behaviour under central point loadings. The range of
parameters used for present investigation as shown in TABLE3.

Table-3 Range of parameters used

Parameters Parameters Range
f’c(MPa) 20-129.1
fy(MPa) 250-678
l (mm) 1000-12000
b (mm) 50-500
d (mm) 90-950
z (mm) 500-6000
ρ (%) 0.13-6.45
ρ ’ (%) 0-4.84
l/d 4.17-21.82
Parametric Study on Rotation and Plastic Hinge Formation
Formation…. 397

Table
Table-4 Correlation matrix.
lp b d f'c ρ l/d
lp 1.000 0.802 0.986 0.549 0.504 0.291
b 0.802 1.000 0.785 0.358 0.284 0.385
d 0.986 0.785 1.000 0.566 0.510 0.145
f'c 0.549 0.358 0.566 1.000 0.471 0.105
ρ 0.504 0.284 0.510 0.471 1.000 0.074
l/d 0.291 0.385 0.145 0.105 0.074 1.000

The correlation matrix analysis values shown in TABLE 4 “The effective depth of the beam”
was found the largest correlation variable in analysis. This variable “d” considered to be
positively correlated with Length of Plastic Hinge ((lp).
Proposed Analytical Model:
The proposed Analytical model has been used to predict the plastic hinge length calculated by
using existing plastic hinge models given by different authors (TABLE
(TABLE-1). 1). The proposed
Analytical model is derived based on shape of bending moment diagram by referring the
FIGURE-11 and by using similar triangle concept the expression for lpcalis formulated.
By using similar triangle concept, considering triangle ACB and AEB from FIGURE-1
FIGURE

= .
( )

∗ = − .
( )
= ………. (iii)

The expressions for yield moment (My) and ultimate moment (Mu) have determined based on
neutral axis depth at yield load (Xy) and neutral axis depth at ultimate load (Xu)

(i) Expression for neutral axis depth at yield load (Xy)

Figure-2 Yield strain diagram Figure-3 Ultimate strain diagram

398 Atul Gopinath et al.

( )
.
= .
.
. ( )
= .
.

Xy=1.75 d -1.75 Xy
Xy= 0.6363 d……………………..……
d……………………..……... (a)
My= 0.87 fyAst(d- 0.42Xy)…………….... (b)

(ii) Expression for neutral axis depth at ultimate load (Xu)

( )
= . .
. .

. ( )
= . .
.

Es = 2x105MPa

. ( )
= ….……. (c)
. .

Mu = 0.87 fyAst (d- 0.42Xu)………. (d)

Figures-4 Comparison between plastic hinge length lpcal v/s plastic hinge length ‘l
‘ p’

It has been observed from FIGURE -4 the comparison of proposed length of plastic hinge
lpcalv/s existing analytical models lptrend lines shows that, the lpcal model is wellpredicted
with Mattock, Sawyer and Panagiotakos&Fardismodels with R2 values are 0.9222, 0.9449
and 0.9371 respectively. Therefore the proposed model is observed to be more realistic which
takes into consideration of all the influencing parameters on th
thee length of plastic hinge (l
( p).
Summary and Conclusions:
Based on the parametric study and proposed nonlinear regression analysis the following
conclusions have been drawn.
Parametric Study on Rotation and Plastic Hinge Formation…. 399

1. There are several models which are available for the prediction of plastic hinge
length.
2. It has been observed for unique data, the length of plastic hinge is different for each
existing models.
3. Most of the models have considered the depth of the section and length of the bending
moment diagram from zero moment to the maximum bending moment.
4. It is also been observerd, the rotation capacity of an RC beam, depends upon grade of
concrete, tension and compression reinforcement and also transverse reinforcement.
5. A simple realistic analytical model has been proposed which includes all the
parameters.
6. Evaluation of the proposed simple analytical model has been carried out in the present
investigation by collecting 173 data from the literature.
7. The length of plastic hinge obtained from proposed model was compared well with
existing model.
8. The demonstrative graph has been plotted using, the proposed analytical model to that
of available models from the literature, It was observed that the proposedlpcal model is
wellpredicted with Mattock, Sawyer and Panagiotakos&Fardismodels with R2 values
are 0.9222, 0.9449 and 0.9371 respectively. Therefore the proposed model is observed
to be more realistic which takes into consideration of all the influencing parameters
on the length of plastic hinge (lp).

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400 Atul Gopinath et al.

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