Comparison of structural analysis results with Japanese seismic index method

ABSTRACTIn this study Japanese Seismic Index method that is used to obtain building earthquakeperformance has been examined. This method, provides the fast estimation for the buildingsseismic safety . The aim of this fast investigation method is to decide which buildings needfurther structural analysis and which buildings can be used with their existing seismic safetylevels, instead of obtaining which buildings are earthquake resistant and which are not.Japanese seismic index method is just used for buildings with reinforced concrete frames,shear wall-frames or shear wall systems and this method is used to obtain the seismic safetyof the these types of buildings in a fast way. It is not recommended to use this method for thebuildings older than 30 years and having large physical failure, low material strength orpassed fire. In this method evaluation is done by comparing Is seismic performance index toIso comparison index for each floor and each principle direction of the building individually. IfIs > Iso it shows that building is safe for earthquake, although Is < Iso shows that seismicperformance of building is unknown.In this study, firstly necessary definitions for Japanese seismic index method have been givenand then the method has been applied on examples. In these examples; earthquake loads givenin Turkish Earthquake Resistant Design Code (1998) were used for structural analyses ofexisting buildings, then the results of the Japanese seismic index method and the structuralanalyses results were compared to each other.Key Words: Damage determination, earthquake, seismic performance index, comparisonindex , main structural performance index, seismic safety.