The competitive trends of the civil engineering market have long been forcing structural engineers to develop minimum weight and labor cost solutions. A direct consequence of this new design trend is a considerable increase in floor vibration problems. The main objective of this paper is to present an analysis methodology to evaluate the composite floor's human comfort criteria, considering a more realistic loading model incorporating the dynamic effects induced by people walking. The investigated models were based on floors, with main spans varying from 5m to 10m. Based on an extensive parametric study the composite floors dynamic response was obtained and compared to limiting values proposed by several authors and design standards. The results of the present study indicated that the walking loads could induce the composite floors to reach significant vibration levels implying and violating the human comfort criteria.
Composite floor; steel structures; structural dynamics; computational modeling
