SHAKING TABLE TESTS OF COMPOSITE STRUCTURE OF

REINFORCED CONCRETE AND TIMBER FRAME

Hiroshi Isoda1, Manabu Nakagawa2, Naohito Kawai3, Mikio Koshihara4,

and Yasuhiro Araki5

ABSTRACT: The horizontal composite structure consisting of reinforced concrete and timber frame is tested at full scale
shaking table tests in parameters of specification of the floor and number of stories. Although the eccentricity of this model
is large, there was no damage against a artificial wave in return period of 495 years. Moreover, it turned out that
modification of a timber frame can be reduced by raising the rigidity of horizontal diaphragm to concentrate the shearing
force at the reinforced concrete wall. In a two-story specimen, the connection between a timber frame and the reinforced
concrete wall was damaged. This is considered the second story is easy to be shaken because the rigidity of timber frame
falls. Furthermore, the relation between a real action and the design method was considered.

KEYWORDS: Composite structure, Timber frame, Reinforced Concrete, Shaking table test, In-plane floor stiffness

wooden structure. In this case, instead of the structure of

1 INTRODUCTION 123
Japanese government announced the law to promote the
use of wood on 2010. The one of the purposes of this law
is to facilitate timber based structures in pubic low-rise
buildings. The public buildings are office facilities,
educational facilities such as schools, sports facilities such
as the gym, and social education facilities such as libraries.
In addition to construct the structure with only timbers and
wood-based materials, timber building complex combining
a steel frame and reinforced concrete and wood structure is
also one of the target structural forms. Here, when
focusing on the structural design method of the structure in
combination in reinforced concrete shear wall system and
timber frame, two methods are considered. One is a
method of providing an expansion joint in the connection
between reinforced shear wall system and the timber
structure and the other is designed to be integrated as
transmitted to horizontal force to be imposed on the
structure between them. When designing as an integral
structure, the wood shear wall and/or cross section of
wood-based materials are minimized open and the
structural system is attractive by transferring to the
different structure horizontal force to be supported the
1
Hiroshi Isoda, Kyoto University, Gokasho, Uji, Kyoto, 611-
0011, Japan. Email: hisoda@rish.kyoto-u.ac.jp
2
Manabu Nakagawa, Shinshu University, Japan
3
Naohito Kawai, Kougakuin University, Japan
4
Mikio Koshihara, The University of Tokyo, Japan
5
Yasuhiro Araki, Building Research Institute, Japan
suppressing the eccentricity by placing proportionately the
wall, the eccentricity of the building becomes large. It is a
structure which may not be allocated structural safety in
the current building standard.
In this study, full-scale shaking table tests for structure in
combination in a plane the reinforced concrete and wood
structure were carried out to confirm the structural safety
under severe earthquake. The parameters of the specimen
were the specification of the floor, the number of the
stories. The relationship of the seismic performance and
design values obtained from designing several methods
decided with reference to current building standard was
also discussed.
2 SPECIMEN
The specimen consists of a reinforced concrete shear wall
system and timber based column and beam structure. The
footprint of RC concrete shear wall system is 8 × 4m and
timber frames is 2 × 4m as shown in Figure 1. The
excitation is a short-side direction of the specimen. The
specimen is comprised of a total of three different
specifications and floor in-plane shear performance as
shown in Table 1. In the specimen of one story building,
the purpose is the understanding of the extent of stress
transfer to the R/C concrete shear wall due to differences
in floor stiffness such as reinforced concrete floor and
nailed plywood floor from timber structure. In the
specimen of two story building, the tests was carried out
to evaluate the stress transfer in the difference of the
number of layers and to observe damages under extremely
severe earthquake. In addition to the live load, the weight
of the concrete finishing material (thickness of t = 40mm)
are loaded on a timber floor. It is equivalent to the weight
of the seismic force calculation for the weight of the RC
floor and timber floor. Shear wall of the RC structure is
made of a wall thickness of 180mm and length of
2,000mm both excitation direction and perpendicular
direction of excitation. Timber beam and column were
used for structural laminated timber (E105-F300) of a 120
x450mm and 170x170mm dimension respectively.
Connection between timber beam and column is called as a
tension bolts type consisting of square steel bar embedded
in screw and M16 bolt. A split ring was used in a surface
with beam and column to resist the shear force. The
connection between reinforced concrete system and timber
Figure 1: Outline of Specimen
floor is five M12 bolts in one surface shear connection.
Further, the joints tree beams orthogonal direction
oscillating obsess the RC concrete system, to obtain a
tension bolts form of timber frame similar using the
hardware shown in the lower part of Figure 2. Timber floor
of JAS second grade structural plywood (thickness of
t=24) was fastened to the timber beams at 50mm intervals
periphery using the CN75 nails. The RC slab of thickness
of 80mm and D10@100 was connected to reinforced
concrete system by D16 embedded 150mm depth.

3 TEST RESULT
After the BCJ wave of maximum acceleration 350gal
which is an artificial wave with almost same destructive
power of the Japanese building standard law and 1995
JMA Kobe wave of 818gal, no damage and no residual
displacement appeared in both specimens of the timber
floor and the RC slab. In the two story specimen, no
damage and no residual displacement appeared after them,
but the crack and destruction were occurred after the JMA
Kobe scaled in 110% of original wave. Concrete surface
was damaged by the compression and slitting was occurred
in the timber connection. Shear bolts between timber floor
and reinforced concrete system were all broken by shear
force. Figure 3 shows the shear force loaded in each frame
and reinforced concrete shear wall in specimen of one
story and timber floor. It is found that the shear force of Figure 2: Connections
timber frame is reduced.

4 CONCLUSIONS
In floor specification set in this specimen in spite of timber
floor, the shear force produced in timber frame under
earthquake was transmitted to the reinforced shear wall
system. As described in this study, it was confirmed
through shaking tests that the method for building with
Figure 3: Shear Distribution in One Story R/C Floor
high eccentricity can be designed with structural safely

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Authors are grateful to members of the committee for

This study was carried out as the Project of Development discussing structural design method and specimen and for
and Research on Timber Based Composite Structure. cooperating the execution of shaking table tests.