Comparisons were made on the behavior of two full-sized reticulated domes subjected to uniform static loads only and uniform static loads with earthquake excitations. Space truss elements were used in the dome models. The stiffness matrix of the space truss element allows for the nonlinear strain-displacement behavior and the stress-strain behavior of the material is modeled with a bilinear approximation. The nonlinear solution technique is the Newton-Raphson method while the direct integration technique is the Newmark- Beta method.

The joint displacements for the static and the dynamic analyses were compared for both domes along with the axial stresses in all members. The percentage increases in the axial stresses of the dynamic analyses as compared to those of the static analyses were determined.

The reticulated domes used in the study were found to bet capable of withstanding the earthquake excitations when subjected to various uniform loads without failure.