Structural design of high‐rise buildings using steel‐framed modules: A case study in Hong Kong

Abstract

Steel-framed modular buildings afford certain advantages, such as rapid and high-quality construction. However, although steel-framed modules have been adopted in several countries, most of them are limited to low-to-medium-rise structures; modular high-rise buildings are rare. This study proposes a feasible structural design solution for high-rise buildings using a steel-framed modular system. A 31-story student hostel building in Hong Kong is redesigned as a steel-framed modular building and used as a case study. The finite element models of the building are formulated, and the structural behaviors under wind and earthquake load scenarios are compared. Moreover, the structural design process used for the 31-story building is applied to design a hypothetical 40-story modular building to further examine the proposed design solution. The numerical analysis results indicate that the roof lateral displacements and interstory drift ratios of the redesigned modular building are within the allowable limits of design codes; moreover, the modular connections behave elastically under the most adverse loading scenarios. Accordingly, the proposed solution can be used to design steel-framed modular buildings of up to 40 stories, while complying with relevant wind and seismic codes.