ABSTRACT
This study comprehensively investigates the effect of infill walls on the dynamic Characteristics of RC buildings using the operational modal analysis (OMA) method. The dy- namic characteristics of a five-storey RC residential building were evaluated by both theoretical and experimental methods. In the SAP2000 software, a finite element model was created by care- fully defining material properties, geometric parameters, and support conditions. Initially, the modal parameters (natural frequencies and mode shapes) were calculated without considering the infill walls. Experimental modal parameters were obtained by measuring the structural response to environmental vibrations using the OMA method. The comparison of theoretical and experi- mental results revealed the differences between modal frequencies and mode shapes, and these differences formed the basis for the calibration of the model. Then, infill walls were added to the model as equivalent diagonal struts, and model calibration was performed. The results show that considering the contribution of infill walls to structural stiffness increases the accuracy of dy- namic parameters and plays a significant role in structural safety assessments.
