This paper briefly reviews results from tests on the behavior of cast-in-place prestressed concrete rigid frame structures. The structures consisted of long span prestressed concrete beams and reinforced concrete columns, and were subjected to simulated earthquake loads. Four 2-story 1/3 scale model frames, two of beam yield type and two of column yield type were tested under pseudo dynamic and static cyclic loadings. The frames exhibited stable hysteretic behaviour up to the story drift angle of 1/30 without significant reduction in load carrying capacity.

A hysteretic model for prestressed concrete structures was proposed based on the past experimental studies on prestressed concrete beams and prestressed concrete beams-reinforced concrete columns assemblies. Non-linear dynamic response analyses using the proposed hysteretic model traced the response of the model frame specimens subjected to the pseudo dynamic loading with reasonable accuracy. The increased response of prestressed concrete structures compared with reinforced concrete structures were demonstrated by non-linear dynamic response analysis on single-degree and multi degree of freedom systems with the proposed hysteretic model.