Wharf and module interaction

[camel7]

Hi,

I am Designing Structural modules which will supported on Wharf. For design and analysis of modules I have used spring support to simulate the actual behaviour of modules on Wharf, I dervied the spring stiffness from analysing the wharf separetly and inputing this deck stiffness in the spring supports for modules. I was just wondering if anyone has designed and worked on this kind of problem before? Is my approach correct?

camel

 

[cessna98j]

Is your wharf really flexible enough you have to account for its deck stiffness in your analysis? I am not too familiar with a structural module, but assume it's some type of modularized process equipment or similar.

What is the construction of your wharf like, pile supported concrete deck? I would think you could analyze the structural module as if it was founded on concrete unless the relative size is significant enough to have a big impact on your wharf. If that's the case, it may be good to analyze them together in a single model.

If you're looking at seismic, it may be beneficial to model these together to capture additive dynamic effects. This is especially true if the fundamental period of the wharf is close to the period of your module. MOTEMS has guidance on this if your above deck structure is within twice the period of the wharf.

 

[MiketheEngineer]

Unless you have a "floating" wharf - why not just assume a statci foundation of sorts??

 

[camel7]

Thanks for the replies,
Yes The Wharf is supported by pile with concrete deck. I did the Structural design and analysis of modules separtely and transfered the reactions over to the wharf. but when I check the design of the overall model with wharf and structural modules quite a few members fail. I want to simulate the same combination effect of the wharf to the individual module models. As the file size becomes very heavy and is very difficult to handle it.
So I considered the three dimensional springs to get the effects. BUt this gives me result which are not matching with my overall combined model results.
So just wondering if I am going somewhere wrong?
hope to hear from you guys....
thanks
Camel