City Research Online

Abstract

Conventional reinforced concrete (RC) structures are vulnerable to significant damage during strong earthquakes, leading to costly and complex repairs. To mitigate such damage, this study investigates the seismic performance of RC beam–column exterior joints incorporating partially debonded high-strength (PDHS) reinforcements. Seven 1/3-scale specimens were tested under quasi-static loading using two protocols: Normal Cyclic (NC) and Multiple Reversed Cyclic (MRC). The latter was adopted to reproduce at the component level the cumulative cyclic displacement demand associated with long-period ground motions (LPGMs). The debonded treatment of the reinforcements was examined using two types of tube materials: rigid polyvinyl chloride (PVC) tubes and high-strength rubber (HSR) tubes. The experimental results showed that the specimens with PDHS detailing presented smaller residual deformations compared with the fully bonded specimen. Within the scope of the present tests, the debonded specimens suppressed crack propagation in the beam region. Specimens using PVC tubes exhibited smaller residual deformations, whereas those using HSR tubes showed greater energy dissipation capacity. The strength degradation and residual drift evolution under MRC loading were quantified. Besides, numerical simulation method using OpenSees accurately captured key experimental responses, validating the effect of debonding length of the reinforcements. A comparative evaluation of the shear strength of the joints based on several code provisions and literature revealed that ACI 352R-02 provides the closest prediction of the shear strengths in the study. A simplified expression was proposed to evaluate the equivalent viscous damping ratio based on idealized hysteresis loops, and the calculated results generally captured the experimental trends.

Publication Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2026, Elsevier. This is the accepted manuscript of an article published by Elsevier. Please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions for information on re-use.
Publisher Keywords:	RC beam-column joint, Partially debonded reinforcement, Seismic performance, Self-centering, High-strength reinforcement, Equivalent viscous damping, Long-period ground motions, 0905 Civil Engineering, 1201 Architecture, 1202 Building, 3302 Building, 4005 Civil engineering
Subjects:	T Technology > TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General) T Technology > TH Building construction
Departments:	School of Science & Technology School of Science & Technology > Department of Engineering
SWORD Depositor:	Symplectic Administrator

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