Abstract
In the conventional reliability-based design method of structures, the reliability of a partially damaged structure that is not satisfied with the demand performance has not been considered. In performance-based design, however, the intermediate state such as partially damaged state that is between two distinguished states (perfect functioning and complete failure) should be considered. Especially, in an emergency, it is important to know if structures that break down partially can function at the level. If a structure is considered to be MSS (Multi-State System), the reliability-based design of this structure can be performed with considering the partially damaged state. In this study, a reinforced concrete short column is treated as a MSS structural example, the three reliability indices such as the availability, the mean performance and the expected performance deficiency are calculated and compared with the reliability index evaluated by a conventional reliability evaluation method, and then some advantages of this proposed reliability evaluation method using MSS is verified.
