Seven Story Building Slice Blind Prediction Contest Rules
1. All information and details regarding the blind prediction contest can be
found on the following web site http://nees.ucsd.edu/7Story.html .
2. A contest submittal can be from an individual or a team.
3. An individual can only be on one team
4. If an individual is part of a team, the individual cannot submit separately as
an individual.
5. The individual or team must use the contest submittal spreadsheet provided
on the NEES-UCSD website and values shall be input as follows. Note that
values shall be input in US Customary Units as indicated below.
a. Displacements are to be provided in inches to two decimal figures (i.e. 10.24
in.). To convert displacements in meters to inches, multiply by 39.37 in/m.
b. Accelerations are to be provided as a fraction of the acceleration of gravity,
g, to three decimal figures. (i.e. 0.345)
c. Interstory drift ratios are to be input in non- dimensional units (not
percentages) to five decimal figures (i.e. 0.01452 in./in.).
d. Overturning bending moments are to provided in kip-feet to one significant
figure (i.e. 236.3 kip-ft). To convert kNm to kip-feet multiply by 0.7376 kipft / (kNm).
e. Shear forces are to be provided in kips to two decimal figures (i.e. 12.38
kips). To convert kN to kips multiply by 0.2248 kips/kN.
e. Displacements are to be interpreted as relative displacements between the
floor level and the base of the structure (top of shake table).
f. Strains are to be input in non-dimensional units (not percentages) to 5 places
beyond the decimal point (i.e. 0.00312).
g. Accelerations are to be interpreted as total accelerations.
h. All values shall be input on the spreadsheet as positive values. The word
“envelope” in Section 6 below shall be interpreted the largest of the absolute
values of the maximum positive or maximum negative value under
consideration.
i. The name of lead team member and their email contact address, the
category of the submitter or team (see item 7 below) and the computer
analysis program (if any) used to compute the predicted responses shall be
input on the spreadsheet. In a separate email with a different email address
we would appreciate it if each submitting team would indicate that they had
submitted an entry and the names of the individuals on their team and their
country. Do not include the prediction sheet, or email contact address found
on the prediction sheet in the second email.
6. Predicted values shall be input for the 4 historical records (EQ-1, EQ-2, EQ3 & EQ-4). EQ-1 = 1971 San Fernando EQ VNUYS Long, EQ-2 = 1971 San
Fernando EQ VNUYS Trans, EQ-3 = 1994 Northridge EQ WHOX Long,
EQ-4 = 1994 Northridge EQ Sylmar 360 as reproduced by the UCSD-NEES
Shaketable.
a. System overturning moment envelope - computed at the base of each floor
(that is, above the foundation and above each slab) and taken about the
centerline of the main wall tested.
b. System shear force envelope - computed at the base of each floor (that is,
above the foundation and above each slab).
c. Horizontal floor acceleration envelope (in terms of g) - computed at the base
of each floor.
d. Lateral displacement envelope - computed at the base of each floor.
e. Interstory drift ratio envelope – computed from lateral displacements above
each slab (or foundation for the first level).
f. For the response of the EQ-4 Record, computed residual lateral
displacements.
g. For the 4 EQ Records, computed maximum vertical compressive strain in
the concrete and maximum vertical tensile strain in the reinforcing steel 10
inches above the wall base ( 40 inches above the shake table platen).
7. The individual or team must declare one of the 3 categories on the
Spreadsheet:
a. Engineering Practioner
b. Academic and Research Community (including graduate students and postdoctoral fellows)
c. Undergraduate Student (Undergraduate student teams may have one
graduate student or faculty advisor. However the advisor can only guide the
work or answer questions. The actual work (i.e. modeling and analysis) must
be done by the undergraduates.
8. Except for Prize Winners, all submittal predictions will be kept anonymous.
Results will be compared unlabeled. However, the names and affiliations of
all submitting teams will be identified based on the information provided in
the second email (See item 5.i above).
9. Submittals shall be emailed to blindprediction@nees.org by midnight Pacific
Daylight Time, May 15th.
10. The lead team member of the apparent award winners will be contacted by
email at their contact email address given on their prediction sheet on May
25th. After judges confirm that the winning teams had met all the Rules, the
winning teams will be announced by email on May 31st to all submitters to
their contact email address. Announcements will also be prepared and
provided to all organization that had been provided the initial contest
announcements.
11. The following system will be used to judge the prize winners:
a. The root-mean-square error will be computed between each of the response
quantity requested at each floor or level in Section 6 a to g and that
measured.
b. The team with minimum error will receive 8 points.
c. The second team will receive 4 points.
d. The third team will receive 2 points.
e. The fourth team will receive 1 point.
All points will be added up and the team with the greatest total will be
declared winner of its category.
12. Force calculations will be computed by the judging team assuming an
acceleration of gravity of 32.18 feet/ sec2. (9.81 m/sec2), a unit weight for
reinforced concrete of 0.150 kips/ft3 (23.6 N/m3). All recorded time histories
will be band-pass with a zero-phase digital filtering of order 5000 (filtfilt in
Matlab).
13. Students and staff at UC San Diego are not eligible to participate in the
14. contest. The judges are also not eligible to participate. Judges for the contest
will be Bob Bachman, SK Ghosh and Jose Restrepo.
15. There will be one award for each category. The award will consist of a
plaque and a monetary prize. The monetary prize for each category is $ 2500
which will be considered as taxable income to the prize winners. Prizes will
awarded at the 2006 NEES Annual Meeting.
16. A representative of the prize winning teams will be invited to the NEES
annual meeting in June 21-23 2005 in Washington DC with reasonable travel
expenses paid for by the contest program. The representative will be asked
to make a presentation on the techniques used (model and analysis) in
making their winning predictions.
17. NEESinc will also reimburse Annual meeting registration for a
representative from up to 8 teams in each of the three contestant category.
18. Questions about the blind prediction contest or details of the structure or
ground can be submitted to blindpredictionquestions@nees.org until May 5,
2006. Questions and answer will be posted on the web site
http://nees.ucsd.edu/7Story.html and will be updated weekly.
19. The measure response values include nonlinear material and nonlinear
geometric effects if there are any. It is expected that the best predicted values
will also consider these effects.
20. The rotational stiffness to account for rocking of the shake table and
foundation of the shake table are provided in a separate table on the website.
It is expected that the best predicted values will consider these added rocking
behaviors.