e-conference Proceeding :: Tower Design

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e-conference on Indian Seismic Codes :: Proceedings

Tower Design
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Renuka Umesha [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 1:17 PM]

Ramesh P. Singh [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 3:13 PM]
Anuj Sangal [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 3:59 PM]
Jaswant N. Arlekar [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 4:28 PM]
Ramesh P. Singh [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 6:19 PM]
Anuj Sangal [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 6:48 PM]
Ramesh P. Singh [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 8:35 PM]
Alpa Sheth [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 9:03 PM]
Ramesh P. Singh [Wednesday, January 30, 2002 12:43 PM]
M. Hariharan [Tuesday, February 05, 2002 8:40 PM]

Renuka Umesha [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 1:17 PM]

Dear Sirs,
Thank you for hosting the e-conference on earth quake codes and related topics.
We are design consultants. We take up the work of designing of Microwave towers. Now-a-days it is required to design
the towers for both earthquake loads and wind loads. Usually the Microwave towers will govern by wind loads because of
wind loads on antennae. We assume that the cyclone and earthquake will not come simultaneously. So we are designing
the towers for wind loads (governing loads) only without considering the earthquake loads. Please suggest us whether the
procedure following by us is correct or is it required take combination of earthquake load and wind load. If it is so, what
are load-factors should we consider for earthquake load and wind load in the design.
Thanking you,
Yours faithfully,

Renuka

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Ramesh P. Singh [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 3:13 PM]

In response to Renuka Umesh's mail,

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 e-conference Proceeding :: Tower Design

I would like to say that when you are making your microwave tower due to wind load generated from Cyclones, one
should also consider the load due to earthquake. I am sure you will be designing towers in the near vicinity of the coastal
region or along the coastal region. In these regions, there may be situation, when one can expect earthquake also. If you
account both the loads simultaneously, one may consider distribution of the earthquake load and wind load on the tower
carefully. While taking the wind load, the direction of the wind is important which will depend on if your tower is in the
vicinity of east or west coast.

Ramesh P. Singh

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Anuj Sangal [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 3:59 PM]

i am working for an inter national consultant abroad. nowhere it a structure like towers are designed for seismic loads. only
wind loads are governing. these are truss like structures and do not need any seismic detailing. these fail only during
cyclones 'vortex generation'.

Anuj Sangal
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Jaswant N. Arlekar [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 4:28 PM]

I agree with Prof. R. P. Singh that the towers should be checked for both wind and earthquakes. The probability of
earthquakes and windloads acting at the same time has been discussed previously..
<clip>
Dr. Mahendran,
The probability of an earthquake and a strong wind occurring simultaneously is very, very low. Normally, the structure is
designed for an earthquake of about 200-year return period, and a wind of say 50-year return period. The probability of
both occurring simultaneously is 1 in 10000.
M. Hariharan
<clip>
In my understanding, the steel towers have small mass to stiffness ratio. Which indirectly means that the earthquake
stresses will be small. However, in case of some large antennas, the stress in some members may be large. Thus, to be sure
that this case of overstressing of some members does not occur, the tower needs to be checked for earthquake loads too.

Jaswant N. Arlekar
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Ramesh P. Singh [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 6:19 PM]

Dear Anuj,
May be you are only designing for non seismic prone areas. The Indian Consultants are worried for the winds generated by
the Cyclones, as you wrote, you consider wind, i.e. natural wind - very strong like cyclone winds at some places. It is wise
thing, if you account earthquake loads if the region is like Indian shield where intraplate earthquakes are more prevalent.

R.P. Singh

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Anuj Sangal [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 6:48 PM]

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 e-conference Proceeding :: Tower Design

Dear Dr. Singh,

Can you recall me. i had come once and met you. may be you remember. Towers need not be designed for earthquake. the
final design loads are very less compared to wind loading on conductors, aircraft warning spheres, insulators etc. No
designer can cater for vortex or cyclone in towers. No specification talk of it. We must not forget that somebody is paying
for the designs. Desins can be made for any loads. Some may be genuine loads some out of possiblities which may occur
once in million cases. No client will pay for such load cases. By the way i am active in designing of Power Plant
structures, Substation, Transmission lines.

Anuj Sangal
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Ramesh P. Singh [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 8:35 PM]

dear Anuj,

It is nice to hear from you. I fully agree with you, wind load is much larger compared to earthquake in non-seismic prone
areas. It does not mean that you can not account while designing a tower, if you are talking of a tower in the central part
of India, the wind load one may consider lower compared to the coastal region, but at the same time one must account
higher load due to earthquake rather than wind in central part of India. There may not be any provision in the code but one
MUST consider the earthquake load while designing tower with respect to location. So my humble request is to account all
the possible loads and make provision in the building codes, you practice depending upon location and also importance of
the buildings/projects. In the region like Gujarat (coastal region) one MUST follow strictly and account for earthquake as
well as wind loads.
Best wishes,

R.P. Singh

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Alpa Sheth [Tuesday, January 29, 2002 9:03 PM]

Hi,
I wonder why one would want to take wind and earthquake forces simultaneously ..... I'd be curious to know if any code in
the world recommends such. As an academic exercise, one could check the design of such towers for earthquake forces,
but I doubt if it would ever govern. Perhaps liquefaction of soils during an earthquake is a possibility and one may take
that into cognisance. I don't know if the relevant IS codes on such steel towers discuss eq. forces in the load cases to be
considered. I know the one on steel transmission towers does not.

Cheers,
Alpa

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Ramesh P. Singh [Wednesday, January 30, 2002 12:43 PM]

I wonder why one would want to take wind and earthquake forces simultaneously ..... I'd be curious to know if any code
in the world recommends such. The distribution of two forces on the tower will be different, one may consider these loads
simultaneously. I do not think by considering the two forces simultaneously cost of the tower will increase significantly.
There may not be any code in the world, one may check but I am sure Japanese must have thought about these two forces.
It may be good for Earthquake Engineers to consider these two forces in updating the seismic codes. Ofcourse, if one has
to make tower in Antartica, one should forget about earthquake load since the region is not seismic prone and also
vulnerability is minimal. For Indian region, vulnerability is high due to cyclone and earthquakes (vulnerability is the
function of risk and population). I may add here that in the coastal region and vicinity, may be affected by the cyclone
wind for about a week, during this period, there may be earthquake or may not be earthquake. But why one should ignore
the possibility of an earthquake!
I am really surprised to read
As an academic exercise, one could check the design of such towers for earthquake forces, but I doubt if it would ever
govern. Perhaps liquefaction of soils during an earthquake is a possibility and one may take that into cognisance. If the
simultaneous occurrence of cyclone and earthquakes is possible, although the possibility is remote but as far as the seismic
code is concern, the earthquake Engineers MUST consider and one should not simply say that one may consider for an
academic exercise. The practicing Engineers can always do this trivial exercise and get an answer rather than to wait for
the academician or researchers.

Ramesh P. Singh

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M. Hariharan [Tuesday, February 05, 2002 8:40 PM]

This is in response to observations on the microwave towers design. Normally, when I am in such a situation, I do a
numerical verification. It gives a "feel" for the design better than all the theory.

Take a typical tower. Model it as a "stick" with varying mass and inertia. Perform a response spectrum analysis to obtain
the shear and moment distribution along the height. By using different factors you can get the values for different
earthquake zones.

For the same tower, compute the wind shear and moment distribution along the height. Again, by using different factors,
you will get values for different wind areas.

Comparing the two, a good feel of the relative severity of the two for different regions could be deduced.

My guess is that, because of the flexibility and low weight at the upper region, the seismic effects would be less critical
than the wind effects for almost all regions other than the Himalayas

Slightly off the track question to the tower designers: Do you calculate wind forces on individual members including shape
factor effects, or do you use projected area and solidity ratio? Further, do you do a dynamic analysis?

M. Hariharan
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