Effect of the vertical earthquake component on nonlinear behavior of an arch dam having a foundation with discontinuities

In this study, the effects of the vertical component of ground motion on both the safety factor of wedge and response of dam having a foundation with joints are investigated. The Bakhtiari arch dam, with 6 wedges at each of its abutments, is chosen as a case study. The safety factor of dam abutments is obtained by the implementation of time history analysis and Londe limit equilibrium method. The thrust forces are calculated using ABAQUS, a commercial finite element software package. The safety factors of wedges are obtained using the code written within MATLAB. The results indicate that considering the vertical component of the earthquake decreases the safety factors of the wedges considerably. Moreover, the vertical component of ground motion plays a key role in the nonlinear behavior of the dam having a jointed foundation.