An experimental study of in-plane arch-shaped dampers

Abstract

As an effort to minimize material utilization, seismic steel dampers designed to deform inelastically in an in-plane flexural mode have attracted serious attention recently. This paper presents a new type of metallic yielding damper referred to as the in-plane arch-shaped damper modified from its portal frame-shaped counterpart by replacing the straight beam with a circular arch to minimize the effects of stress concentration and warping, and therefore to avoid premature failure. Component tests of both the portal frame-shaped and arch-shaped in-plane dampers were conducted for comparison. Hysteresis loops obtained from the component tests under cyclic loads indicate substantial improvement on the energy-dissipative characteristics of the proposed damper. Moreover, seismic performance assessment of the proposed damper was carried out further via shaking table tests of a five-story model frame. Encouraging results have been achieved in terms of acceleration reduction, damping enhancement and peak suppression of the frequency response functions, suggesting the potential of the proposed device to be used in earthquake-resisting systems.