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Civil-Comp Proceedings
ISSN 1759-3433
CCP: 108
PROCEEDINGS OF THE FIFTEENTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON CIVIL, STRUCTURAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING COMPUTING
Edited by: J. Kruis, Y. Tsompanakis and B.H.V. Topping
Paper 172

Improving the Seismic Performance of Buildings by Increasing Structural Damping

H. Al-Rifaie1 and S. Wilkinson2

1College of Engineering, Salahaddin University-Erbil, Kurdistan Region, Iraq
2School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University, United Kingdom

Full Bibliographic Reference for this paper
H. Al-Rifaie, S. Wilkinson, "Improving the Seismic Performance of Buildings by Increasing Structural Damping", in J. Kruis, Y. Tsompanakis, B.H.V. Topping, (Editors), "Proceedings of the Fifteenth International Conference on Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering Computing", Civil-Comp Press, Stirlingshire, UK, Paper 172, 2015. doi:10.4203/ccp.108.172
Keywords: structural damping, fluid viscous dampers, frame lateral stiffness, free vibration test, natural period, shaking table, inter-storey drift, Eurocode performance limits.

Summary
In previous earthquakes, seismic resistant buildings were successful in ensuring the safety of occupants; however, the required repair budget was high due to the massive structural and non-structural damage. The aim of the study, presented in this paper, is to examine whether increasing structural damping can limit inter-storey drifts, induced by ultimate seismic loads, to the serviceability limit state specified by the Eurocode. This project has examined the feasibility of that, by testing a three-storey structural model on the Newcastle University shaking table, with and without improved fluid viscous dampers. This study includes two static tests (for finding stiffness), three free vibration tests (for quantifying natural period and damping) and twenty-eight dynamic tests (for evaluating inter-storey drifts). Software analyses, using space gass, were also used to check the physical properties of the model, such as stiffness and natural period. The model was tested without dampers and with the proposed viscous damper. The new introduced pipe connected dampers (PCD) can be considered as a novel idea presented in the study. Attachment of the PCD significantly increased the damping from 1.88 percent to 15.65 percent. PCDs were not able to limit ultimate drifts to serviceability drifts; however, it allowed the authors to find an exponential curve that can relate damping ratio to inter-storey drift. This curve was used to calculate damping required to meet Eurocode damage limit which was quantified as 21.6 percent. Experts in this field believe that the construction of cost-effective energy dissipation systems that provide around 20 percent damping might be possible.

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