A practical and efficient coupling method for large scale soil–structure interaction problems

•A novel coupling method for nonlinear SSI analysis is presented, with both implicit and explicit methods developed.•Frequency dependent compliance functions are represented in time domain by a discrete recursive soil filter method.•Analytical solution to MDOF linear structure-rigid foundation-linear half space soil systems is derived in frequency domain.•A comprehensive study to the method is made for SDOF/MDOF structure–soil systems and a Millikan Library SSI example.

A practical and efficient coupling method for performing nonlinear static pushover or time history analysis for soil–structure interaction (SSI) systems is presented. The method combines the advantages of efficient analysis of a half-space soil medium represented as discrete filters and powerful modeling capabilities of finite element analysis (FEA) software for large scale nonlinear structural systems, thus is potentially useful for solving large scale realistic civil infrastructure problems. The boundary conditions of displacement continuity and force equilibrium between soil and structure are satisfied by using Newton׳s method. The coupling between the two substructures is based on a real-time data communication technique called the client–server (CS) integration technique. A comprehensive study is made regarding the newly developed coupling method by using a single- and a multi- degree of freedom structure and soil systems, as well as a real world SSI example. Several details are discussed, including the effect of simulation time step sizes, comparison of implicit and explicit methods, effects of increasing nonlinearity in the SSI system, and the nonlinear seismic responses of the SSI systems in cases of considering vs. not considering SSI effect. This paper proposes a practical and efficient method for nonlinear static pushover or seismic analysis of large scale SSI systems, and part of the research results provides valuable insight for engineering practice.