PTED beam to column connections for seismic resistant steel frames

PTED beam to column connections, recently proposed as an alternative to welded connections for moment resisting steel frames, show attractive properties of re-centring and energy dissipation, thanks to the presence of opportune high strength steel systems post-tensioned in elastic field, aimed at restoring the undeformed configuration, and systems with hysteretic or friction behaviour, aimed at dissipating the input energy. Such systems are object of research at international level both in experimental and numerical fields, with the scope of characterizing the mechanical behaviour of the connection and evaluating the influence on the global response of steel structures. At the University of Naples a campaign of numerical analyses was developed through the Finite Element calculation program ABAQUS, aimed at the mechanical identification of some PTED devices proposed in literature, to the purpose of optimizing the system and defining appropriate design criteria. In this context, the present study deals with the analysis of the cyclic behaviour of a steel single story substructure, equipped with PTED connections