Fema

DISCLAIMER This document provides recommended criteria for the design of steel moment-frame buildings to resist the effects of earthquakes. These recommendations were developed by practicing engineers, based on professional judgment and experience, and by a program of laboratory, field and analytical research. While every effort has been made to solicit comments from a broad selection of theaffected parties, this is not a consensus document. It is primarily intended as a resource document for organizations with appropriate consensus processes for the development of future design standards and building code provisions. No warranty is offered, with regard to the recommendations contained herein, either by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the SAC Joint Venture, the individual JointVenture partners, or their directors, members or employees. These organizations and their employees do not assume any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any of the information, products or processes included in this publication. The reader is cautioned to review carefully the material presented herein and exercise independent judgment as to itssuitability for application to specific engineering projects. These recommended criteria have been prepared by the SAC Joint Venture with funding provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, under contract number EMW-95-C-4770.

Cover Art. The beam-column connection assembly shown on the cover depicts the standard detailing used in welded steel moment-frame construction prior to the 1994Northridge earthquake. This connection detail was routinely specified by designers in the period 1970-1994 and was prescribed by the Uniform Building Code for seismic applications during the period 1985-1994. It is no longer considered to be an acceptable design for seismic applications. Following the Northridge earthquake, it was discovered that many of these beam-column connections had experiencedbrittle fractures at the joints between the beam flanges and column flanges.

Recommended Seismic Design Criteria for New Steel Moment-Frame Buildings SAC Joint Venture
A partnership of
Structural Engineers Association of California (SEAOC)
Applied Technology Council (ATC)
California Universities for Research in Earthquake Engineering (CUREe)
Prepared for SAC Joint Venture Partnershipby
Guidelines Development Committee
Ronald O. Hamburger, Chair John D. Hooper Robert Shaw Lawrence D. Reaveley Thomas Sabol C. Mark Saunders Raymond H. R. Tide

Project Oversight Committee
William J. Hall, Chair Shirin Ader
John M. Barsom
Roger Ferch
Theodore V. Galambos
John Gross James R. Harris Richard Holguin Nestor Iwankiw Roy G. Johnston Leonard Joseph Duane K. Miller JohnTheiss John H. Wiggins

SAC Project Management Committee
SEAOC: William T. Holmes ATC: Christopher Rojahn CUREe: Robin Shepherd Program Manager: Stephen A. Mahin Project Director for Topical Investigations: James O. Malley Project Director for Product Development: Ronald O. Hamburger SAC Joint Venture SEAOC: www.seaoc.org ATC: www.atcouncil.org CUREe: www.curee.org June, 2000

THE SAC JOINTVENTURE
SAC is a joint venture of the Structural Engineers Association of California (SEAOC), the Applied Technology Council (ATC), and California Universities for Research in Earthquake Engineering (CUREe), formed specifically to address both immediate and long-term needs related to solving performance problems with welded, steel moment-frame connections discovered following the 1994 Northridgeearthquake. SEAOC is a professional organization composed of more than 3,000 practicing structural engineers in California. The volunteer efforts of SEAOC’s members on various technical committees have been instrumental in the development of the earthquake design provisions contained in the Uniform Building Code and the 1997 National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP) Recommended...