Design of liquid storage tanks needs special considerations on the complex interaction between the structure and the liquid during earthquakes. Earthquake may cause severe sloshing in a liquid storage tank resulting from the interaction. This sloshing...
Design of liquid storage tanks needs special considerations on the complex interaction between the structure and the liquid during earthquakes. Earthquake may cause severe sloshing in a liquid storage tank resulting from the interaction. This sloshing gives dynamic loading effects on the tank structure. The loading effects are classified as general effects and local effects. General effects include the increase in hydraulic dynamic pressure on the wall, which have been well considered in the current design. However, local slashing effects, as impact loads acting on localized parts of structures, have not yet considered in the current design of liquid storage tanks.
This research deals with the localized effects of sloshing impact loads acting on tank structures in liquid storage tanks during earthquakes.
In order to achieve the goal of this research, at first, the phenomenon of sloshing has been investigated. Then as a preliminary study, theoretical concepts on nonlinear dynamic analysis have also been investigated.
As the next step, nonlinear dynamic structural analyses have been carried out to figure out the effects of the localized impact loads due to sloshing and to examine the safety level of the tank structure. Based on the analytical results, the current design has been evaluated.
The results show that the localized sloshing load intensity corresponding to the earthquake level specified in Korea Design Code, is almost negligible and the effect of the localized impact pressure is in the safe side.