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This paper discusses model, design, and application of viscous dampers in one the skyscraper in New York City.
The two frame office towers, constructed in the 1970s per the 1967 edition of the UBC, use perimeter reinforced concrete moment frames to resist seismic loading. The buildings are rectangular in plan and have certain characteristics that adversely affect their seismic performance, in particular the presence of a soft-story response at the first floor (approximately 50% taller than typical floors), and limited ductility typical of buildings of that era. Risk analysis showed that for the towers the PML exceeded 20%. Nonlinear response history analysis (NLRHA) of the towers was conducted and showed that in the existing configuration, the story drift ratios (SDRs) at the first floor exceeded 2%, shear hinging of the first floor beams was expected and that the SDRs would need to be reduced to approximately 1.4% for the first floor to limit the extent of nonlinear response. Seismic retrofit included addition of 300-kip viscous dampers in both directions to the first floor of the building.
This paper provides a case study of a five story commercial building, where supplemental fluid viscous dampers are combined with a steel moment frame structure to provide a dual seismic resisting system. The paper outlines the analysis and design procedure.
This paper will outline the specifics in quantifying the continued damper performance through an intermediate inspection after seven years, followed by a successful comprehensive inspection after eleven years. This included the removal, dynamic testing, and re-installation of three selected dampers.
Soft weak open front (SWOF) buildings often perform poorly in earthquakes. Two examples are buildings with a street facing garage, or commercial facilities with extensive open display windows. The poor performance of SWOF structures can consist of complete loss of use or even total collapse. This paper presents an approach to protecting such structures via the addition of an energy dissipation system (viscous dampers) such that peak inter-story drifts are limited to about 1% under relatively severe seismic events, thus keeping the deformations within the elastic range. With this addition of damping, earthquake survivability of this class of structures increases significantly. A series of seismic analyses are presented herein to demonstrate the potential performance of the damping system. In addition, a variety of damper installation configurations that provide enhanced energy dissipation are discussed.
Equivalent lateral force and modal analysis procedures for yielding buildings with damping systems were developed, validated, and incorporated in the 2000 NEHRP Provisions. Key to the implementation of the procedures was the validation process that demonstrated the accuracy of the proposed procedures. The procedures for implementing yielding, viscoelastic, linear viscous, and nonlinear viscous dampers were tested using the results of nonlinear response history analysis on sample three- and six story frames and were found to be robust.
Two adjacent wings of a three story office building in Southern California were found by analysis to be excessively responsive in torsion under an earthquake on the near-by Newport-Inglewood fault, some five miles from the site. The generous 4.5″ seismic separation between the two office building segments was found to be inadequate to prevent heavy pounding even in a moderate event, having a high probability of occurrence at this location. A variety of structural retrofit schemes were evaluated to mitigate the excessive torsional responses of the two building segments. These included converting the perimeter gravity frames to moment resisting frames, adding diagonal bracing to the perimeter frames, tying the two structures together at each floor level, and using viscous dampers as attachments between the buildings. The best solution from a cost, schedule, construction disruption, and earthquake performance standpoint, turned out to be joining the two building segments with horizontally oriented viscous dampers at a single floor level. This paper describes the analysis and retrofit solution that was used, and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the retrofit options studied.
Adding damping with various energy dissipating devices has become an accepted method to reduce wind induced vibrations in tall buildings. An example of a 39-story office tower is presented where large projected accelerations generated by the vortex shedding of an adjacent existing 52-story building are reduced by a passive system composed of viscous dampers and a motion amplification system. A description of the damping system and its analytical complexities are discussed. Non-linear analysis of the tower, using time history forcing functions derived from the wind tunnel is presented. Cost data for the damper system is also presented.
Fluid Viscous Devices have been found to be a highly effective protection system for bridges. Introduced to China in 1999, the Taylor Devices damper systems have been successfully installed or will be installed in both large and super large bridges in China for protection from earthquake, wind, vehicle and other vibration. Seventeen different bridge projects include the Sutong Yangtze River Bridge, the longest cable stayed bridge in the world, the Nanjing 3rd Yangtze River Bridge, the fifth longest suspension bridge in the world, and the Xihoumen across Sea Bridge, the second longest suspension bridge in the world. The performance of the bridges and dampers have been reported as “very good” during the May 12, 2008 Wenchuan earthquake. All of the dampers produced have been subjected to rigorous static and dynamic testing, which show the dampers will perform well for the next 50 years and possibly much longer.