Drift Design Method for High-rise Buildings using

Dynamic Resizing Algorithm

Seo Ji Hyun1, Hyo Seon Park2
1

Ph. D. Candidate, Dept. of Architectural Eng., Yonsei University

2

Associate Professor, Yonsei University

Abstract
Structural optimization algorithms based on sensitivity coefficients in drift design of high-rise buildings
are far from being practical because of computational requirements. In recent years, various drift design
method based on member displacement participation factors have been developed for sizing members to
satisfy stiffness criteria. However, there is no practical resizing algorithm for drift design of structures
subjected to dynamic lateral forces. Therefore, in this paper, a resizing algorithm based on dynamic
displacement participation factor obtained from response spectrum analysis is presented for drift design of
steel structures subjected to seismic lateral forces. The performance of the algorithm is evaluated using a
braced frame structure.
Keywords: Drift Design, Steel Structure, Dynamic Displacement Participation Factors, Resizing Techniques

1. Introduction
The structural design of high-rise buildings includes
the process of schematic designs, structural analysis,
strength designs, and stiffness designs. Until now the
effectiveness of a structural design has depended on a
designers heuristics based on experience but recently
many researches have been carried out using
optimization techniques to improve the effectiveness
and automation of the structural design. As buildings
increase in height, the amount of material required is
determined by the structural stiffness criteria with
respect to inter-story drifts, the maximum
displacement on the top of building, and natural
periods rather than member strength criteria. Although
many drift control methods have been developed with
the basis on existing optimization algorithms, the
application to practical affairs is excessively restricted.
Resizing technique which uses the unit load method
had been developed for structures subjected to static
load by Baker (1990), Forrest-Brown and Samali
Contact Author: Hyo Seon Park, Professor, Dept. of
Architectural Engineering, Yonsei University, 134

(1990), Charney (1991), and Park and Park (1997), and

then the part is applied to practical affairs. On the other
hand, a lot of difficulties still remain in applying the
drift design of the structures subjected to dynamic
forces to practical affairs, even if the researches
regarding the dynamic sensitivity analysis and
optimization techniques are actively advanced. In this
paper, a practical dynamic resizing algorithm will be
developed to control the lateral displacement of a steel
frame structure subjected to a seismic force

2. Formulation of resizing algorithm

Dynamic displacement participation factors
The drift design method which uses resizing
technique is based on the principle of virtual work and
determines the redistributed quantity by the strain
which is accumulated in each member. From the unit
load method, the displacement of structure can be
found by summing dynamic displacement participation
factors (DDPFs) for all members in a structure:
m

i =1
m

= i =
i =1

S
U
l M
N i S N iU
i Mi
dx +
dx
0
E Ai
E Ii

(1)

Shinchon-dong, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, 120-749, Korea

Tel:(82-2)2123-2794

Fax:(82-2)365-4668

e-mail: hspark@yonsei.ac.kr

1052

CTBUH 2004 October 10~13, Seoul, Korea

+a

lT T
Vi V i

dx + i i dx
0 G I
G Ai

pi
S

where Ni, Mi, Vi, and Ti are the stress resultants of the
ith member due to the actual load or the unit load
respectively. Ai, Ii and Ipi are the cross-sectional area,
the moment of inertia, and the polar moment of inertia
of the ith member. The stress resultants due to the
actual load and the unit load are identified by the
superscripts S and U, respectively.
In equation (1), m is the total number of structural
members in a structure and E and G are the modulus of
elasticity and the shear modulus of elasticity,
respectively. is the displacement to be controlled and
i is the DDPF defined by each members contribution
to the displacement, which consists of four
components: axial, bending, shear and torsional
displacement components for all members in a
structure. In this paper, DDPF is calculated by using
response spectrum analysis (RSA).
In RSA, the maximum response ( nmax) of the nth
story is given in the following form.
(2)

n max = n Yn max = Ln S dn n

where n, Ln, and Sdn are the mode shape, the mode
participation factor and the spectral displacement of
the nth mode. The lateral displacement ( srss) can be
presented by the square root of the sum of the squares
(SRSS) of the responses in each mode.
srss =

n max

(3)

)2

Modification factor
In this paper, the drift control technique based on
DDPF is developed from introducing cross-sectional
modification factor (i) as a design variable. The
optimization problem considered in this research is
presented in the following form.

Subject to

i '
i =1 i
m

i =
m

(4)
m

A L = A L
i =1

m
'i
m

+ L i i Ai Li i Ai Li

i =1
i =1
i =1

i
m

i =

i =1

(5)

where i is the modified displacement to be controlled

and iis the initial DDPF of each member. Ai, i, and
Li are the cross-sectional area, the density and the
length of the ith member. In this formulation, it is
assumed that the DDPF of each member is inversely

(6)

where L is the Lagrange multiplier. In this

optimization problem, the displacement is minimized
without changing the weight of a structure at the final
stage of the design process.
Taking derivatives of the transformed objective
function with respect to i and L, let the equations
equal to zero.
i
'
= 2i + L i Ai Li = 0
i
i

(7)

i = 1, m

m
i m
= i i Ai Li i Ai Li = 0
L i =1
i =1

(8)

According to equation (7) and (8), the modification

factor (i) is calculated in the following form.
m

i =

AL

i
'

i Ai Li

j =1

i =1

n=1

Minimize

proportional to the change of the weight of the member.

The constrained optimization problem in equations (4)
and (5) can be transformed into an unconstrained
optimization problem by introducing the Lagrange
multiplier.

i = 1, m

(9)

i i Ai Li
'

where m is the total number of structural members in a

structure. The initial displacement to be controlled is
reduced to i by equation (9) and the weight of each
member is redistributed without the change in the total
weight of the structure.
For over all structural design model for high-rise
buildings, the proposed drift design method using the
resizing algorithm is combined with usual strength
design module as shown in Fig 1.

3. Example
This example is a 21-story braced steel frame
structure. The model with the height of 79.5 m has unit
story height as 3.75 m, except the first story equal to
4.5 m. The base dimensions of the model in the x- and
y-directions are 21 and 20 m respectively.

CTBUH 2004 October 10~13, Seoul, Korea

1053

21

3.75m

28
14

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

79.5m 3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

3.75m

14

14
20

13
19

11
18

34

13

33

12

33

12

33

12

32

11

32

11

32

11

31

10

31

10

31

10

30

16

30

30

29

15

29

4
18
4
17
3
17
3
17
3
16
2
16
2
16
2
15
1
15

22

15

18

22
8

18

22

15

19

23

16

19

23
9

19

23
9

20

24
10

20

24
10

16

4.5m

13

24
10

17

34

20

25
11

17

7m

13

25

18

17

7m

34

25
11

21

26
12

18

21m

14

26
12

19

7m

35

26
12

19

7m

14

27

20

6m 20m

35

27
13

21

27
13

20

7m

14

28

21

X - Braced frame

21
35

28

21

1
15

29

Fig. 2 21-story braced steel structure

Fig. 1 Drift design model of high-rise buildings
Table 2 Structural weight
2

The loads consist of a dead load 3.29 kN/m , a live

load 1.26 kN/m2, and an earthquake load. The seismic
load is presented with the response spectrum scaled
proportionally down the northern and southern
direction component of the earthquake, which occurs
at El Centro in United States in 1940, with the
maximum ground acceleration equal to 0.13 G and
5 % damping ratio.
A unit load is applied at point A where the
maximum displacement occurs. Before applying the
drift design method, RSA is used for dynamic analysis
and the commonly used design specification, allowable
stress design (ASD), is used for preliminary structural
member design (AIK, 2000).
Table 1 Displacement participation factors
Member

Preliminary

After
resizing

After
Drift
Design

Re-analysis

Column

10.61

9.94

9.90

10.17

Girders

5.48

4.97

4.40

4.43

Brace

2.86

2.29

2.29

2.51

Total

18.95

17.20

16.59

17.10

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CTBUH 2004 October 10~13, Seoul, Korea

Member

Preliminary

After
resizing

After
drift
design

Re-analysis

Column

1125.13

1140.24

1143.26

1143.26

Girders

632.11

577.16

668.00

668.00

Brace

235.07

274.92

274.92

274.92

Total

1992.32

1992.32

2086.18

2086.18

From the dynamic analysis with the preliminary

design, the lateral displacement of 18.949 cm at the top
of the structure is estimated by adding up the member
displacement participation factors of all members as
given in Eq. (1). By applying the drift design model,
the lateral displacement of 17.197cm at the top of the
structure is estimated.
The lateral displacement is reduced by 9.3% of the
initial drift without changing the structural weight.
Member displacement participation factors and
structural weight are shown in Tables 1 and 2,
respectively. From these results, it is clear that the
material of girders should be redistributed to columns
and brace members.

For the drift design, no additional structural weights

are required to satisfy the displacement constraints
(H/450) at the top of structure. In the final stress check
stage in Fig. 1, the structural weight of columns is
increased and the displacement is decreased by
16.59cm.
The structural analysis using commercial soft-ware
with the modified cross- sectional properties gives a
displacement of 15.34cm. The error in the
displacements from the exact analysis and the resizing
algorithm for this example is found to be
approximately 8 %.

21
18

Story

15
12

In addition to the maximum lateral displacement,

inter-story drift must not exceed a certain limit. From
the response spectrum analysis with the preliminary
design, the maximum inter-story drift of 0.917cm
0.26% of the height of a typical story is found at 17th
story level.
Based on the drift design model, the maximum
inter-story of 0.896cm of 0.23% of the height of a
typical story is found at the 18th story level. The
distributions of lateral displacement and inter-story
drift through the height of the structure before and
after application of the drift design model are shown in
Figs. 3 and 4.
The change of natural periods and mass
participation factor by applying drift design model
shown in Figs. 5 and 6. Natural periods are decreased
at 1st ~5th modes, and mass participation factors are
decreased at 1st mode, but increased at 2nd~5th
modes.

9
2.5

6
Preliminary

Preliminary
After drift design

After drift design

0
5

10

15

20

Displacement (cm)

(Sec)

1.5

Fig. 3 Distribution of Lateral Displacements along the

Height of the Building

0.5

0
1st

2nd

3rd

4th

5th

Fig. 5 Natural Periods

21

Preliminary
After drift design

18

80

15

Preliminary
After drift design

12
60

50
(%)

Story

70

40
30

20
10

0
0

0.25

0.5

0.75

Inter-story drift (cm)

Fig. 4 Inter-story drift

0
1st

2nd

3rd

4th

5th

Fig. 6 Mass participation factors

CTBUH 2004 October 10~13, Seoul, Korea

1055

From these results, it is clear that the decrease of

displacement is largely dependent on the decrease of
natural periods. The change of mode shape by
applying drift design model shown Fig. 7.(a),(b),(c).
Mode shapes are similar before and after applying the
drift design model.

21
18

Story

15
12
9

4. Conclusion

6
3

Preliminary
After drift design

0
0

0.0005

0.001

0.0015

1st mode

Fig. 7(a) 1st mode shape

21

In this paper, the resizing algorithm based on the unit

load method and dynamic analysis is developed and
applied to drift design of tall steel structures subjected
to dynamic lateral forces. During the drift design
process, the active members were identified by DDPF
instead of calculating computationally intensive
sensitivity information. As demonstrated in the
examples, the dynamic resizing algorithm shortens the
first period and thus effectively controls the
displacement.

18

Acknowledgement

15

This material is based on work sponsored by Ministry

of Construction & Transportation of Korea under grant
C102A1000004-03A0200-00410, which is gratefully
acknowledged.

Story

12
9
6

References

Preliminary
After drift design

0
-0.001

0.001

0.002

2nd mode

AIK. 2000. Standard Design Loads for Buildings, Architectural

Institute of Korea, Seoul, Korea.
Baker, W. F. (1990) Sizing Techniques for Lateral Systems in
Multi-story

Fig. 7(b) 2nd mode shape

Steel

Buildings,

Proceedings

from

the

conference: Tall Buildings and 2000 and Beyond, 857-868

Chareny, F. A. (1991) The Use of Displacement Participation
Factors in the Optimization of Drift Controlled Buildings,

21

Proceedings of the conference on Tall Buildings in Seismic

Regions, Los Angeles, CA, 91-98

18

Forrest-Brown, G. and Samali, B. (1990) Practical Optimization

15

of Framed Structures Using Virtual Work Principals, 4th

World Congress, Tall buildings: 2000 and Beyond, Hong

Story

12

Kong

Convention

and

Exhibition

Center,

CTBUH,

1019-1029
Park Hyo Seon, and Park Chil Lim. (1997) Drift Control of

High-rise Buildings with Unit Load Method, The Structural

3

Preliminary
After drift design

0
-0.002

0.002

0.004

3rd mode

Fig. 7(c) 3rd mode shape

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CTBUH 2004 October 10~13, Seoul, Korea

Design of Tall Buildings, Vol. 6, No. 1, 23-35

Park Hyo Seon, and Seo Ji Hyun. (2002) Drift Design of
Steel-frame Shear-wall Systems for Tall Buildings, The
Structural Design of Tall Buildings, Vol. 11, No. 1, 35-49