Seismic evaluation of wood frame construction based on nail connection deflection status
This paper presents a concept for a seismic evaluation method for wood frame construction based on analyzing the nail connection performance status. An empirical nail model adjusted using an energy equivalence principle is proposed and experimentally validated. Then, a pushover analysis is conducted on a finite element model of a wood frame construction with a practical configuration, and the structural performances under different seismic hazard levels are evaluated based on the indicators given by FEMA 273. With the methodology proposed in this paper, engineers are able to directly perform an effective seismic evaluation by analyzing the nail connection performance status, from which the main nonlinearity of the wood frame construction originates.