Effect of Pulse-Type Ground Motions on the Rocking Response of Rigid Blocks on Deformable Media

This paper studies the rocking behavior of rigid blocks resting on a deformable floor under pulse-type ground motions. The deformable floor has been simulated by a concentrated spring model and the friction as analytical friction considering Coulomb’s model. The importance of the residual part and pulse part of the ground motions in the rocking response of rigid blocks has been studied by considering 40 pulse-type ground motions. The study shows that, although the pulse part dominates the failure in most cases, in some cases the non-pulse residual part of the motion may be responsible for the failure of the blocks.