Forced Vibration Testing of Full-scale Non-seismic Reinforced Concrete Frame Structure Retrofitted Using FRP Jacketing System
Existing reinforced concrete building structures have seismic vulnerabilities due to their seismically-deficient details resulting in non-ductile behavior. The seismic vulnerabilities can be mitigated by retrofitting the buildings using a fiber-reinforced polymer column jacketing system, which can provide additional confining pressures to existing columns to improve their lateral resisting capacities. This study presents dynamic responses of a full-scale non-ductile reinforced concrete frame retrofitted using a fiber-reinforced polymer column jacketing system. A series of forced-vibration testing was performed to measure the dynamic responses (e.g. natural frequencies, story drifts and column/beam rotations). Additionally, the dynamic responses of the retrofitted frame were compared to those of the non-retrofitted frame to investigate effectiveness of the retrofit system. The experimental results demonstrate that the retrofit system installed on the first story columns contributed to reducing story drifts and column rotations. Additionally, the retrofit scheme helped mitigate damage concentration on the first story columns as compared to the non-retrofitted frame.