SHIVAJI UNIVERSITY, KOLHAPUR

A SYNOPSIS REPORT ON

SEISMIC PERFORMANCE OF MULTI-STOREY RCC BUILDING

WITH FLOATING COLUMN
SUBMITTED BY
MR. DHANANJAY RAHANGDALE
M.E. (CIVIL- STRUCTURES)
Under Guidance of

Prof. Dr S. K. Hirde
Applied Mechanics department
Government College of Engineering, Karad

DEPARTMENT OF APPLIED MECHANICS

GOVERNMENT COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING, KARAD.
YEAR 2015-2016.

SYNOPSIS
1) Name of College

: Government College of Engineering, Karad.

2) Name of Course

: M. E. [Civil - Structure]

3) Name of the Student

: Mr. Dhananjay Tejram Rahangdale

[PRN NO.1412703236]

4) Date of Registration

: August 2014.

5) Name of Guide

: Dr. S.K.Hirde.
Prof, Applied Mechanics Department,
Government College of Engineering, Karad.

6) Registration No

: SU/PGBUTR/Recog/85,No.5694,Dt.22 Oct.2011.

7) Name of Dissertation : SEISMIC PERFORMANCE OF MULTI-STOREY RCC

BUILDING WITH FLOATING COLUMN
8) Relevance:
Now a days multi-storey buildings constructed for the purpose of residential, commercial,
industrial etc., with an open ground storey is becoming a common feature. For the purpose of
parking, usually the ground storey is kept free without any constructions, except the columns
which transfer the building weight to the ground. For a hotel or commercial building, where
the lower floors contain banquet halls, conference rooms, lobbies, show rooms or parking
areas, large interrupted space required for the movement of people or vehicles. Closely
spaced columns based on the layout of upper floors are not desirable in the lower floors. So to
avoid that problem, floating column concept has come into existence.
The behaviour of a building during earthquakes depends on overall shape, size and geometry.
The earthquake forces developed at different floor levels in a building need to be brought
down along the height to the ground by the shortest path. Any discontinuity in this load
transfer path results in poor performance of the building. Buildings with vertical setbacks
(like the hotel buildings with a few storeys wider than the rest) cause a sudden jump in
earthquake forces at the level of discontinuity. Buildings that have fewer columns or walls in
a particular storey or with unusually tall storey tend to damage or collapse which is initiated
in that storey. Earthquake are natural hazards under which disaster are mainly caused by
damage or collapse of buildings. Many buildings with floating column adopted to get more

space for parking or reception lobbies collapsed and were severely damaged in earthquake.
Earthquake load depends on seismic zones, types of soil.
Concept of floating column
A column is supposed to be a vertical member starting from foundation level and transferring the
load to the ground. The term floating column is a vertical element which (due to architectural
design/ site situation) at its lower level (termination Level) rests on a beam which is a horizontal
member. The beams in turn transfer the load to other column below it. There are many projects

in which floating columns are adopted, especially above the ground floor, where transfer
girders are employed, so that more open space is available in the ground floor. These open
spaces may be required for assembly hall or parking purpose. The transfer girders have to be
designed and detailed properly, especially in earth quake zones.

(Source: earthquake tips)

The column is a concentrated load on the beam which supports it. As far as analysis is
concerned, the column is often assumed pinned at the base and is therefore taken as a point
load on the transfer beam. STAAD Pro, ETABS and SAP2000 can be used to do the analysis
of this type of structure. Floating columns are competent enough to carry gravity loading but
transfer girder must be of adequate dimensions (stiffness) with very minimal deflection, this
need not be done at the cost of poor behaviour and earthquake safety of buildings. When
irregular features are included in buildings, a considerably higher level of engineering effort
is required in the structural design and yet the building may not be as good as one with simple
architectural features.

Literature review:
Prerna Nautiyal et al. [1] performed linear dynamic analysis on 2D multi-storey building
frame with and without floating column to achieve the effect of a floating column under
earthquake excitation for various soil conditions and evaluated factors for safe and
economical design of a building having floating column under earthquake excitation (which
is not specified in I.S.Code).by using response spectrum analysis of building which is carried
out on STAAD PRO.
S.G. Nanabala et al. [2] studied the analysis of a G+5 storey normal building and a G+5
storey floating column building for external lateral forces. The analysis is done by the use of
SAP 2000. They also studied the variation of the both structures by applying the intensities of
the past earthquake i.e. applying the ground motions to the both structures, from that
displacement time history values are compared. They also find whether the structure is safe or
unsafe with floating column when built in seismically active areas and also to find whether
the floating column building is economical or uneconomical.
M.K. Srikanth and Y R. Holebagilu [3] studied the analysis of floating column building
with some complexities where consider for ten story building at different alternative location
and for lower and higher zones. The high rise building is analyzed for earthquake force by
considering two type of structural system. i.e. Frame with only floating column and floating
column with complexities for RCC building. Finally, analysis results in the high rise building
such as storey drifts, storey displacement, and storey shear were compared in this study.
Analysis was carried out by using (ETABS) version 9.7.4 software.

Sabari S. and Mr. Praveen J.V [4] studied the analysis of 2D multi-storey building with and
without floating column. By using FEM analysis to study the response of structure under
different earthquake excitation having different frequency content. By keeping PGA and time
duration factor constant. They compared the time history of roof displacement; inter storey
drift, base shear, column axial force is computed for both the frames with and without
Floating Column.

A.P. Mundada and S.G. Sawdatkar [5] studied the existing residential building of G+7
storey with detailed architectural drawing and the framing drawing of the building having
floating columns. They studied the various effects due to load distribution on floating
column. They also studied the importance and effect of line of action of force and
comparative study of seismic analysis of multi-storied building with and without floating
columns. The equivalent static analysis was carried out on the entire project mathematical 3D
model using the software STAAD Pro V8i and the comparison of these models are been
presented.
Hardik M. et al. [6] studied the effects of floating column & soft storey in different
earthquake zones by seismic analysis. For this purpose Push over analysis was adopted
because this analysis yield performance level of building for design capacity (displacement)
carried out up to failure, it helps determination of collapse load and ductility capacity of the
structure. To achieve this objective, three RC bare frame structures with G+4, G+9, G+15
stories respectively will be analyzed and compared the base force and displacement of RC
bare frame structure in different earthquake zones.
Ashwin Sanjay Balwaik [7] studied a comparative analysis of G+1 structure with and
without floating columns. He compared maximum bending moment of the structures i.e. the
cost of the structure is mainly dependent on the maximum bending moments which was
obtained by analysis. A 2D frame analysis has been done using SAP 2000. The comparative
analysis gives the maximum bending moment that comes on structures with and without
floating column. From which he get more economical structure.
Susanta Banerjee, Sanjaya Kumar Patro [8] studied the effect of stiffness of infill wall to
the damage occurred in floating column building when ground shakes. Modelling and
analysis are carried out by non linear analysis programme IDARC-2D. Damage occurred in
beams, columns, storey where studied by formulating modified Park & Ang model to
evaluate damage indices. Overall structural damage indices in buildings due to shaking of
ground are also obtained. Dynamic response parameters i.e. lateral floor displacement, storey
drift, time period, base shear of buildings where obtained and results are compared with the
ordinary moment resisting frame buildings. Formation of cracks, yield, plastic hinge, where
observed during analysis.

Nikhil B. et al. [9] studied the analysis of a G+6 storey building with different architectural
complexities such as External Floating Columns, Internal floating columns and combination
of Internal and External Floating columns where analyzed for various earthquake zones. In
overall study of seismic analysis, critical load combinations where obtained. For these critical
load combinations, Case wise variation in various parameters like displacements, moments
and Forces on columns and Beams at Various floor level are compared and significant corelationship between these values are established with Graphs. This Building was Design and
Analyse with the help of STAAD-Pro Software.
Sarita Singla and Ashfi Rahman [10] studied the effects of the structural irregularity
which produced by the discontinuity of a column in a building subjected to seismic loads.
They also studied static analysis and dynamic analysis using response spectrum method on
multi-storeyed building with and without floating columns. Different cases of the building are
studied by varying the location of floating columns floor wise and within the floor. The
structural response of the building models with respect to Fundamental time period, Spectral
acceleration, Base shear, Storey drift and Storey displacements is investigated. The analysis
was carried out by using software STAAD Pro V8i software.
Isha R. et al. [11] studied the the critical position of floating column in vertically irregular
buildings where analysed for G+5 and G+7 RC buildings for zone II and zone V. They also
studied the effect of size of beams and columns carrying the load of floating column. The
response of building such as storey drift, storey displacement and storey shear used to
evaluate the results obtained using ETABS software.
P. V. Prasad and T. Raja Sekhar [12] studied the seismic analysis of building by using FEM
codes for 2D multi-storey frames with and without floating column to study the response of
the structure at different earthquake condition for different frequency by keeping the PGA
and time duration factor constant. They also studied the building under static load, free
vibration and forced vibration condition. Result where plotted for both frame with and
without floating column by comparing time history of floor displacement, base shear. The
equivalent static analysis is carried out by using STAAD Pro V8i.

Concluding remark
From the literature review it has been seen that many research papers are available to study
the behaviour of multi-storey building with floating column. However there is a lack of
information regarding pushover analysis and different seismic parameter over the buildings.

Proposed work:
From literature review it has been seen that many research papers are available to study effect
of earthquake force on multi-story building with and without floating column. There are four
seismic zones in India. Performance of multi-storey building with floating column under
these zones is necessary to study.
The objectives of proposed work as follows:
1

To study the available literature regarding pushover analysis, for multi-storey building

2
3

with floating columns.

To study the location of floating column on seismic performance of G+7 building.
To study the effect of type soil on seismic performance of building with floating

column.
To study the effect of earthquake forces on performance of multi-storey building with

floating column under different zone in India by response spectrum method.

To carry out the pushover analysis to study the performance point and hinge pattern in
building with floating column.
The analysis will be carried out by using SAP2000 software.
Facilities available:
1. College central library for reference journals and book.
2. Various website and journal through internet for collection of required literature.
3. Library facility of IIT, Mumbai is possible.
Expected date of completion: June 2016
Expected expenditure of work: Rs 12000/-

References:
1) Prerna N., Saleem A., Geeta B.,2014, Seismic Response Evaluation of RC Frame
Building with Floating Column Considering Different Soil Conditions International
Journal of Current Engineering and Technology vol.4

2) S.G. Nanabala, Ramancharala, Arunakanthi,2014, Seismic Analysis of A Normal

Building and Floating Column Building International Journal of Engineering Research
& Technology Vol. 3
3) Srikanth.M.K and Yogeendri.R.Holebagilu, 2014, Seismic Response of Complex
Buildings with Floating Column for Zone II and Zone V International Journal of
Engineering Research, Vol.2
4) Sabari S. and Mr. Praveen J.V,2014, Seismic Analysis of Multi-storey Building with
Floating Column International Journal of Civil And Structural Engineering Research,
Vol. 2
5) A.P. Mundada and S.G. Sawdatkar,2014, Comparative Seismic Analysis of Multi-Storey
Building with and without Floating Column International Journal of Current Engineering
And Technology vol.4
6) Hardik Bhensdadia and Dr. Siddharth Shah,2015, Pushover Analysis of RC Frame
Structure with Floating Column and Soft Storey in Different Earthquake Zones for
Retrofitting, International Journal for Scientific Research & Development Vol. 3.
7) Ashwin Sanjay Balwaik, 2015, Comparative Analysis of G+1 Structure with And
without Floating Column International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research,
Volume 6.
8) Susanta Banerjee, Sanjaya Kumar Patro,2014, Estimation of the Park-Ang Damage
Index for Floating Column Building with Infill Wall International Journal of Civil,
Environmental, Structural, Construction and Architectural Engineering Vol.8
9) Nikhil Bandwal , Anant Pande, Vaishali Mendhe , Amruta Yadav,2014, To Study
Seismic Behaviour of RC Building with Floating Columns International Journal of
Scientific Engineering & Technology Research,vol. 6.
10) Sarita Singla and Ashfi Rahman,2015, Effect of Floating Columns on Seismic Response
of Multi-Storey RC Framed Buildings, International Journal of Engineering Research &
Technology (IJERT) ISSN: 2278-0181 ,vol.4
11) Isha Rohilla, S.M. Gupta, Babita Saini, 2015, Seismic Response of Multi-Storey
Irregular Building with Floating Column,International Journal of Research in
Engineering and Technology Volume: 04, Issue 03.

12) P.V. Prasad, T.Raja Sekhar,2014, Study of Behaviour Of Seismic Analysis of Multi
Storied Building with and without Floating Column Caribbean Journal of science
and Technology , Vol2.

Undertaking of Guide
Information given by the student is correct and the said facilities are available with the
college.

Date: 19/08/2015
Place: Karad

Mr. Dhananjay T. Rahangdale

M.E. (Structural Engineering)
(Student)

Dr. S.K. Hirde

Professor of Applied Mechanics Dept.
Government College of Engineering, Karad
(Guide)