Seismic Retrofit Solutions NZ: Latest News

As part of the final phase of the FRST retrofit project, a series of large-scale as-built and retrofitted reinforced concrete (RC) frame structures will be will be tested on the shake table at the Structures Laboratory of the University of Canterbury. The first of these test is a non-ductile RC frame model structure, representative of pre-1970s New Zealand construction practice. The shaking table tests are part of the PhD research of Patricio Quintana Gallo, supervised by Assoc. Prof. Stefano Pampanin, Professor Athol Carr and Professor Patricio Bonelli.

As the opportunity arise, the main testing session is open for public viewing. The as-built frame will be subjected to a strong ground motion, representative of the Wellington design earthquake scenario. The detail of the test is as follow:

Date: 22nd July 2010 (Thursday)
Time: 9.30am (New Zealand time – GMT+12)
Location: Main Structures Lab, Dept of Civil and Natural Resources Engineering.

The test results including a short video of the dynamic test will be posted online shortly after the test. Please check this website for the latest updates.

As part of a research on understanding the motivations in driving seismic retrofit implementation, University of Auckland PhD student Temitope Egbelakin is currently running a survey on the decision-making process in the ongoing seismic retrofit projects. Click here to participate in the survey.Your contribution is hugely appreciated.

We have updated many of the research topic pages which describe in more detailed the different components of this project. As the outputs of the project become available, more information will be uploaded on this website. It is envisioned that in addition to providing an information portal for researchers, this website would be the main source of disseminations to the New Zealand practitioners - engineers, designers, architect and educators.

Alistair Russell, a PhD student at the University of Auckland (and the former co-webmaster of this website), has recently submitted his thesis on the "Assessment of Existing In-Plane Unreinforced Masonry Walls in New Zealand". Congratulation Alistair!

On Saturday, February 27, 2010 at 06:34 NZT (03:34 Local Time) a M8.8 earthquake struck central Chile, with the epicenter located 35 km offshore of the coast of Maule region (105 km NNE of Concepcion and 335 km SW of Santiago. The earthquake was followed by a tsunami that affected a 200 km long strip of Chilean coast. At the time of the earthquake, one of the project PhD student - Patricio Quintana Gallo was actually at Valparaiso, Chile. He was subsequently invited to join the NZSEE Reconnaissance Team to Chile two months after the event. Further information of that NZSEE Recon mission is available here.

On 30 September 2009 a Richter magnitude 7.6 earthquake occurred approximately 50 km offshore from the Indonesian city of Padang on the west coast of Sumatra. As part of an AusAID initiative, Jason Ingham spent eight days as part of a team conducting detailed structural assessments of damage to school buildings and medical/hospital buildings in the greater Padang region under the jurisdiction of the Australia – Indonesia Facility for Disaster Reduction (AIFDR). Approximately 300 school and 100 medical buildings were assessed during this time. From the data collected, it was possible to identify common structural defects as well as deduce systemic deficiencies in the overall design and construction process for the Padang region.

Currently, the project is under going Contract Terminating Review as the project approaches its final year.Part of the process of this review, a thorough report outlining the project progress and evidence of outputs has been complied. In addition to a detailed listing of the key and current outputs in terms of research and dissemination to the public, the report also outlined the delivery of contracted milestone progress. Interested users can download the report here.

We have updated many of the research topic pages which describe in more detailed the different components of this project. As the outputs of the project become available, more information will be uploaded on this website. It is envisioned that in addition to providing an information portal for researchers, this website would provide sufficient technical guidelines and publications for practicing engineers both within New Zealand and around the world. Within the next 12 months, we will be providing with more in-depth reports / journal publications as well as some of the tools developed within the project. The post-graduate researcher profiles pages have also been recently updated here.

One of the first doctoral students of the project, Dion Marriott will be facing his oral defence within the next couple of days as mentioned in the last update. It is known that his examiner would be the reknown Prof Emeritus Nigel Priestley (of ROSE School/UC San Diego/ Canterbury) and Assoc. Prof Susumu Kono (of Kyoto University). -editor-

The publication pages have been updated, in view of the anticipated publication of technical reports and guidelines, particularly the Seismic Retrofit Handbook. Currently only the journal and conference papers publications are available for viewing. Efforts are being made to ensure all relevant papers and presentations are available for download - after clearing the necessary copyright issues.

The research topic pages are also currently under update, and user would notice many pages currently 'under construction'. This update round will be completed by June 2009. Please come by again for more research update. -editor-

Phd candidate, Kam Weng Yuen presented the preliminary analytical-experimental work on selective weakening techniques for retrofit of existing reinforced concrete structures. Pdfs of the paper and the presentation slides will be available for download shortly in the publication tabs on the left.