Seismic elastic-plastic time history analysis and reliability study of quayside container crane

Quayside container crane is a kind of huge dimension steel structure, which is the major equipment used for handling container at modern ports. With the aim to validate the safety and reliability of the crane under seismic loads, besides conventional analysis, elastic-plastic time history analysis under rare seismic intensity is carried out. An ideal finite element (FEM) elastic-plastic mechanical model of the quayside container crane is presented by using ANSYS codes. Furthermore, according to elastic-plastic time history analysis theory, deformation, stress and damage pattern of the structure under rare seismic intensity are investigated. Based on the above analysis, the established reliability model according to the reliability theory, together with seismic reliability analysis based on Monte-Carlo simulation is applied to practical analysis. The results show that the overall structure of the quayside container crane is generally unstable under rare seismic intensity, and the structure needs to be reinforced.