Optimal Design of Semirigid Connection Steel Frame with Steel Plate Shear Walls Using Dolphin Echolocation Algorithm

Steel frame with steel plate shear walls (SPSWs) is used to resist lateral loads caused by wind and earthquakes in high-rise buildings. In this load-resisting system, the cost and performance are more efficient than in the moment frame system. Behaviors of beam-to-column connections are assumed to be pinned or fixed to simplify the calculation in the past few decades. However, studies have stated that such a simulation fails to reveal the response of beam-to-column connections. In this paper, a newly developed metaheuristic optimization algorithm—the dolphin echolocation algorithm (DE)—based on foraging prey using echolocation in dolphins is applied as the present study optimizer. Two different two-dimensional semirigid connection steel frames with SPSWs are optimized to obtain the minimum cost of semirigid connection steel frame with steel plate shear walls with constraints to element stresses and story drift ratio according to the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) Load and Resistance Factor Design (LFRD). SPSW is modeled as a brace with equivalent lateral stiffness, while the P−△ effects are considered in the steel frame. Semirigid connections are used to reveal the actual responses of beam-to-column connections. The results demonstrate the proposed method’s effectiveness for optimizing semirigid connection steel frames with SPSWs and the interaction between semirigid connections and the SPSWs.

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