Dissipative joints under impact loadings

Unforeseen and unpredictable exceptional events can lead to abnormal loading distribution in the structures; however, in such situation, structures have to withstand additional loadings to avoid disproportionate damage and progressive collapse. Impact loadings are among the excep-tional events that a structure can experience during its lifetime. In order to give a contribution to the research on impulsive loading on structural joints, this work focuses on the behavior of slide hinge joints (SHJ) with a Symmetric Friction Damper (SFD) under drop weight impact tests. Six drop weight impact tests on a double-sided beam-to-column joints were performed and a 3D finite element model was created and validated in ABAQUS/CAE Explicit. The model includes the calibration of material damage, correlating the equivalent plastic strain to the stress triaxiali-ty, damping of the system, calibrated on elastic impact tests using Rayleigh’s classical damping and strain rate sensitivity through the Johnson Cook model. Furthermore, a parametric analysis was performed in order to investigate the influence of three parameters on the joint behavior: the impact velocity, the impact mass and the impact energy. The energy is used to estimate the dissipation rate of the joint, which can be considered as a reliable parameter to quantify the joint behavior under drop weight impact.