The topic of this thesis is base isolation. The purpose of this thesis is to offer a relative understanding of the seismic performance enhancements that a typical 12-story steel office building can achieve through the implementation of base isolation technology. To reach this understanding, the structures of a fixed-base office building and a base-isolated office building of similar size and layout are designed, their seismic performance is compared, and a cost-benefit analysis is completed. The base isolation system that is utilized is composed of Triple Friction Pendulum (TFP) bearings. The work of this thesis is divided into four phases. First, in the building selection phase, the structural systems (SMF and SCBF), layout, location (San Diego, CA), and design parameters of the buildings are selected. Then, in the design phase, each structure is designed using modal response spectrum analysis in ETABS. In the analysis phase, nonlinear time history analyses at DBE and MCE levels are conducted in PERFORM-3D to obtain the related floor accelerations and interstory drifts. Finally, in the performance assessment phase, probable damage costs are computed using fragility curves and FEMA P-58 methodology in PACT. Damage costs are computed for each building and seismic demand level and the results are compared.

Immediate occupancy and functionality of critical facilities including hospitals, emergency operations centers, communications centers, and police and fire stations is of utmost importance immediately after a damaging earthquake, as they must continue to provide fundamental health, emergency, and security services in the aftermath of an extreme event. Although recent earthquakes have proven the acceptable performance of the structural system in such buildings, when designed according to recent seismic design codes, in many cases damage to the nonstructural components and systems was the main cause of disruption in their functionality. Seismic isolation is proven to be an effective technique to protect building structures from damaging earthquakes. It has been the method of choice for critical facilities, including hospitals in Japan and the United States in recent years. Seismic isolation appears to be an ideal solution for protecting the nonstructural components as well. While this claim was made three decades ago, the supporting research for freestanding (unanchored) equipment and contents (EC) is fairly new. With the focus on freestanding EC, this study investigates the seismic performance of sliding and wheel/caster-supported EC in fixed-base and base-isolated buildings. The study adopts a comparative approach to provide a better understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of using each structural system. The seismic response of sliding EC is investigated analytically in the first part of the thesis, while the response of EC supported on wheels/casters is examined through shake table experiments on two pieces of hospital equipment. The study finds base isolation to be generally effective in reducing seismic demands on freestanding EC, but it also exposes certain situations where isolation in fact increases demands on EC. Increasing the frictional resistance for sliding EC or locking the wheel/casters in the case of wheel/caster-supported EC is highly recommended for EC in base-isolated buildings to prevent excessive displacement demands. Furthermore, the study suggests several design probability functions that can be used by practicing engineers to estimate the peak seismic demands on sliding and wheel/caster-supported EC in fixed-base and base-isolated buildings. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Nous nous intéressons aux méthodes de contrôle de vibrations de modèles réduits de structures à n degrés de liberté, sismiquement isolées au niveau de la base par des systèmes d'isolation mixte.Le mouvement provoqué par une sollicitation sismique horizontale a lieu dans le plan vertical.Nous avons construit un problème de contrôle semi-actif de systèmes incertains soumis à des perturbations inconnues, mais bornées. Dans le langage de l'automatique, il s'agit d'un problème d'atténuation de perturbations.Le résultat principal de cette thèse porte sur la construction d'une version modifiée des résultats de Leitmann et de ses collaborateurs sur la stabilisation de systèmes non linéaires incertains. Le théorème proposé repose sur une loi de commande par retour d'état qui assure en boucle fermée les propriétés de "uniform boundedness" et "uniform ultimate boundedness".En particulier, il peut être appliqué à la résolution de problèmes de contrôle semi-actif, qui sont actuellement traités en génie parasismique.L'objectif du contrôle est d'améliorer le comportement (i.e. la réponse) de structures isolées pour faire face aux perturbations externes, c'est-à-dire les séismes. Plusieurs points différencient notre problème de la majorité que l'on trouve dans la littérature: (i) on ne s'intéresse pas seulement à la protection de la structure isolée, mais aussi aux équipements situés à l'intérieur de la structure, et (ii) au lieu d'utiliser des indicateurs de performance habituels exprimés en termes de déplacement relatif de la base versus des accélérations absolues des planchers, nous utilisons uniquement le spectre de plancher en pseudo-accélération, comme il a été proposé dans des travaux précédents par Politopoulos et Pham. Ce travail est une tentative d'utiliser explicitement les spectres de plancher comme critère de performance.Concernant la procédure d'application, plusieurs étapes intermédiaires ont été détaillées:(i) modélisation de signaux sismiques;(ii) réglage des paramètres de la loi de commande utilisant la théorie des vibrations;(iii) validation et test du comportement en boucle fermée à travers des simulations numériques: pour des raisons de simplicité, on se limite au cas n=2.Cette procédure peut être utilisée sur des structures en industrie nucléaire, mais aussi en génie civil.D'autres sujets traités incluent une tentative d'utiliser les outils temps-fréquence, et en particulier la distribution de Wigner-Ville, pour la synthèse de lois de commande, en espérant pouvoir mieux contrôler les composants transitoires des signaux de perturbation (les entrées) et des variables d'état (les sorties). / Vibration attenuation control designs are proposed for reduced plant models consisting of n-degree-of-freedom base seismically-isolated structures (i.e., a specific type of earthquake-resistant design), modeled by uncertain nonlinear systems and subjected to one-dimensional horizontal ground acceleration (i.e. the earthquake signal), treated as unknown disturbance but assumed to be bounded.In control systems literature, this is a perturbation attenuation problem.The main result of this PhD is the development of a modified version of Leitmann and co-authors' classical result on the stabilization of uncertain nonlinear systems. The proposed theorem consists of a bounded nonlinear feedback control law that is capable of ensuring uniform boundedness and uniform ultimate boundedness in closed-loop. In particular, it can be applied to solving semi-active control design problems, which are currently dealt with in earthquake engineering.The control objective is to improve the behavior (i.e. response) of mixed base-isolated structures to external disturbance, namely earthquakes. What differentiates our problem from the majority to be found in the literature is that: (i) attention is being paid to the protection of equipment placed inside the structure an not only to the structure itself; (ii) instead of using regular performance indicators expressed in terms of relative base displacement versus floors accelerations, we use solely the pseudo-acceleration floor response spectra, as it was proposed in previous recent works by Politopoulos and Pham.Actually, this work is an attempt to explicitly use floor response spectra as performance criterion.Concerning the application procedure, some of the topics that were detailed are:(i) modeling of earthquake signals;(ii) tuning of control law parameters based on vibration theory;(iii) validation and testing of the closed-loop behavior using numerical simulations: for simplicity reasons, we take n=2.This procedure can be used on structures of both nuclear industry as well as civil engineering.Other topics include an attempt to using time-frequency concepts and in particular the Wigner-Ville distribution to the control law design procedure, in order to better control transitory components of both perturbation (the input) and state variables signals (the output).

Este artículo consiste en analizar una nueva alternativa de control antisísmico de alta tecnología para la construcción de hospitales en el Perú, que en su normativa exige el uso de aislamiento de base para edificaciones esenciales. Para ello, se opta por la evaluación estructural de una edificación construida con aisladores sísmicos y la misma con implementación del sistema de disipación de energía SLB (Shear Link Bozzo). Los resultados analizados, para cada técnica estudiada de control antisísmico, son: derivas de entrepiso, aceleraciones de piso, balance energético y análisis de rotulas plásticas, en base a la filosofía de funcionalidad continua. / This article consists of analyzing a new high-tech anti-seismic control alternative for the construction of hospitals in Peru, which in its regulations requires the use of base insulation for essential buildings. For this, the structural evaluation of a building constructed with seismic isolators is chosen and the same with the implementation of the SLB (Shear Link Bozzo) energy dissipation system. The results analyzed for each anti-seismic control technique studied are: mezzanine drifts, floor accelerations, energy balance and analysis of plastic hinges, based on the philosophy of continuous functionality. / Trabajo de investigación

<p>Real-time hybrid simulation (RTHS) has demonstrated certain advantages over conventional large-scale testing. In an RTHS, the system that is under study is partitioned into a numerical and a physical substructure, where the numerical part is comprised of those elements that are easier to model mathematically, while the physical part consists of those that present a complex behavior difficult to capture in a numerical model. The most complex part of this study is the isolation system, a technology used to protect structures against earthquakes by modifying how they respond to ground motions. Unbonded Fiber Reinforced Elastomeric Isolators (UFREIs) are devices that can accomplish this task and have gained attention in recent years because of their modest but valuable features that make them suitable for implementation in low-rise buildings and in developing countries because of their low cost. Our end goal for this work is to enable the testing of scaled versions of these elastomeric isolators to understand their behavior under shear tests and realistic loading. </p> <p>A testing instrument was designed and constructed to apply a uniaxial compressive force up to 22kN and a shear force of 8kN simultaneously to the specimens. A testing program was conducted where four primary sources of signal distortion were identified as caused by the servo-hydraulic system. From these results, a mechanics-based model was developed to understand better the dynamics that the sliding table can introduce to the measured signals accounting for inertial and dissipative forces. Two Bouc-Wen models were implemented to simulate the behavior of the UFREIs. The first only accounts for the hysteretic behavior of the isolator, and the second accounts for the additional nonlinearities found in the isolator’s behavior. These models were assembled in a virtual RTHS which is available to users interested in learning the applications of RTHS of a base-isolated structure with a nonlinear component.</p> <p>An RTHS experiment was conducted in the IISL where the control system comprised a delay compensator and a proportional-integral controller, which exhibited a good tracking performance with minimal delay and low RMSE. However, it can increase the distortion of the oil-column resonance in the measured signals. The simulation captures the behavior of the isolated structure for small displacements. However, it underestimates the displacement of the full-scale specimen for large displacements. The RTHS showed a better approximation of the displacement of the full-scale structure than the theoretical behavior approximated by the Bouc-Wen models.</p>

No description available.

Abstract: Highway bridges have great values in a country because in case of any natural disaster they may serve as lines to save people’s lives. Being vulnerable under significant seismic loads, different methods can be considered to design resistant highway bridges and rehabilitate the existing ones. In this study, base isolation has been considered as one efficient method in this regards which in some cases reduces significantly the seismic load effects on the structure. By reducing the ductility demand on the structure without a notable increase of strength, the structure is designed to remain elastic under seismic loads. The problem associated with the isolated bridges, especially with elastomeric bearings, can be their excessive displacements under service and seismic loads. This can defy the purpose of using elastomeric bearings for small to medium span typical bridges where expansion joints and clearances may result in significant increase of initial and maintenance cost. Thus, supplementing the structure with dampers with some stiffness can serve as a solution which in turn, however, may increase the structure base shear. The main objective of this thesis is to provide a simplified method for the evaluation of optimal parameters for dampers in isolated bridges. Firstly, performing a parametric study, some directions are given for the use of simple isolation devices such as elastomeric bearings to rehabilitate existing bridges with high importance. Parameters like geometry of the bridge, code provisions and the type of soil on which the structure is constructed have been introduced to a typical two span bridge. It is concluded that the stiffness of the substructure, soil type and special provisions in the code can determine the employment of base isolation for retrofitting of bridges. Secondly, based on the elastic response coefficient of isolated bridges, a simplified design method of dampers for seismically isolated regular highway bridges has been presented in this study. By setting objectives for reduction of displacement and base shear variation, the required stiffness and damping of a hysteretic damper can be determined. By modelling a typical two span bridge, numerical analyses have followed to verify the effectiveness of the method. The method has been used to identify equivalent linear parameters and subsequently, nonlinear parameters of hysteretic damper for various designated scenarios of displacement and base shear requirements. Comparison of the results of the nonlinear numerical model without damper and with damper has shown that the method is sufficiently accurate. Finally, an innovative and simple hysteretic steel damper was designed. Five specimens were fabricated from two steel grades and were tested accompanying a real scale elastomeric isolator in the structural laboratory of the Université de Sherbrooke. The test procedure was to characterize the specimens by cyclic displacement controlled tests and subsequently to test them by real-time dynamic substructuring (RTDS) method. The test results were then used to establish a numerical model of the system which went through nonlinear time history analyses under several earthquakes. The outcome of the experimental and numerical showed an acceptable conformity with the simplified method. / Résumé: Les ponts routiers ont une grande valeur dans un pays parce qu’en cas de catastrophe naturelle, ils peuvent servir comme des lignes pour sauver des vies. Étant vulnérable sous des charges sismiques importantes, on peut considérer différentes méthodes pour concevoir des ponts routiers résistants et également pour réhabiliter des ponts existants. Dans cette étude, l'isolation de la base a été considérée comme une méthode efficace qui peut réduire significativement les effets des charges sismiques sur la structure. En réduisant la demande en ductilité sur la structure sans une augmentation notable de force, la structure est conçue pour rester élastique sous des charges sismiques. Le problème associé aux ponts isolés, particulièrement avec des appuis en élastomère, peut être leurs déplacements excessifs sous les charges de service et de séisme. Ceci peut défier l’objectif d'utiliser des appuis en élastomère pour les ponts typiques de petite portée où les joints de dilatation et les dégagements peuvent aboutir à une augmentation significative des frais d'exploitation et de maintenance. Ainsi, supplémenter la structure avec des amortisseurs d’une certaine rigidité peut servir de solution, ce qui peut cependant augmenter l’effort tranchant transmis à la sous-structure. Cette étude a pour but de fournir une méthode simplifiée afin d’évaluer les paramètres optimaux des amortisseurs dans les ponts isolés. Dans cette thèse, premièrement, basé sur une étude paramétrique, quelques directions sont données pour l'utilisation de dispositifs d'isolation simples, dont les appuis en élastomère, afin de réhabiliter des ponts existant avec une haute importance. Les paramètres comme la géométrie du pont, les clauses des normes et le type de sol sur lequel la structure est construite ont été appliqués sur un pont typique de deux portées. Il est conclu que les paramètres mentionnés peuvent déterminer l'emploi d'isolement de la base des ponts routiers. À la deuxième phase, basé sur le coefficient de réponse élastique des ponts isolés, une méthode de conception simplifiée d’amortisseur pour des ponts routiers réguliers isolés à la base a été présentée dans cette étude. En sélectionnant des objectifs pour la réduction du déplacement et la variation de l’effort tranchant, la rigidité et l'amortissement exigés d'un amortisseur hystérétique peuvent être déterminés. L’étude s’est poursuivie par une modélisation numérique d’un pont à deux portées pour vérifier l'efficacité de la méthode. Pour un modèle numérique d'un pont isolé typique, la méthode a été utilisée pour identifier des paramètres linéaires équivalents pour un certain déplacement et effort tranchant désigné. Par la suite, assumant un amortisseur de type hystérétique, les paramètres non linéaires de l’amortisseur ont été calculés et utilisés. La comparaison des résultats du modèle numérique sans amortisseur et avec l'amortisseur a démontré que la méthode proposée est suffisamment précise. Par la suite, un nouvel amortisseur hystérétique simple en acier a été conçu. Cinq spécimens ont été fabriqués de deux différents grades d’acier et ont été testés en combinaison avec un isolateur à l’échelle réelle dans le laboratoire de structures de l'Université de Sherbrooke. La procédure comprenait la caractérisation des spécimens par des tests cycliques en contrôle de déplacement et par la suite la réalisation d’essais par la méthode de sous-structuration dynamique en temps réel. Les résultats des essais ont été utilisés pour établir un modèle numérique du système qui a subi des analyses temporelles non linéaires sous plusieurs séismes. Le résultat des essais expérimentaux et numériques montrent une conformité acceptable avec la méthode simplifiée.

Indonesia is a developing country that suffers from earthquakes and windstorms and where at least 60% of houses are non-engineered structures, built by unskilled workers using masonry and timber. The non-engineered housing units developed in urban region are also vulnerable to seismic hazard due to the use of low quality of material and constructions method. Those structures are not resistant to extreme lateral loads or ground movement and their failure during an earthquake or storm can lead to significant loss of life. This thesis is concerned with the structural performance of Indonesian low-rise buildings made of masonry and timber under lateral seismic load. The research presented includes a survey of forms of building structure and experimental, analytical and numerical work to predict the behaviour of masonry wall and traditional timber frame buildings. Experimental testing of both masonry and timber have been carried out in Indonesia to establish the quality of materials and to provide material properties for numerical simulations. The experimental study found that the strength of Indonesia-Bali clay brick masonry are below the minimum standard required for masonry structures built in seismic regions, being at least 50% lower than the requirement specified in British Standard and Eurocode-6 (BS EN 1996-1-1:2005). In contrast, Indonesian timber materials meet the strength classes specified in British Standard/Eurocode- 5 (BS EN 338:2009) in the range of strength grade D35-40 and C35).Structural tests under monotonic and cyclic loading have been conducted on building components in Indonesia, to determine the load-displacement capacity of local hand-made masonry wall panels and timber frames in order to: (1) evaluate the performance of masonry and timber frame structure, (2) investigate the dynamic behaviour of both structures, (3) observe the effect of in-plane stiffness and ductility level, and (4) examine the anchoring joint at the base of timber frame that resists the overturning moment. From these tests, the structural ductility was found to be less than two which is below the requirement of the relevant guidelines from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, USA (FEMA-306). It was also observed that the lateral stiffness of masonry wall is much higher than the equivalent timber frame of the same height and length. The experimental value of stiffness of the masonry wall panel was found to be one-twelfth of the recommended values given in FEMA-356 and the Canadian Building code. The masonry wall provides relatively low displacement compared to the large displacement of the timber frame at the full capacity level of lateral load, with structural framing members of the latter remaining intact. The weak point of the timber frame is the mechanical joint and the capacity of slip joint governs the lateral load capacity of the whole frame. Detailed numerical models of the experimental specimens were setup in Abaqus using three-dimensional solid elements. Cohesive elements were used to simulate the mortar behaviour, exhibiting cracking and the associated physical separation of the elements. Appropriate contact definitions were used where relevant, especially for the timber frame joints. A range of available material plasticity models were reviewed: Drucker-Prager, Crystalline Plasticity, and Cohesive Damage model. It was found that the combination of Crystalline Plasticity model for the brick unit and timber, and the Cohesive Damage model for the mortar is capable of simulating the experimental load-displacement behaviour fairly accurately. The validated numerical models have been used to (1) predict the lateral load capacity, (2) determine the cracking load and patterns, (3) carry out a detailed parametric study by changing the geometric and material properties different to the experimental specimens. The numerical models were used to assess different strengthening measures such as using bamboo as reinforcement in the masonry walls for a complete single storey, and a two-storey houses including openings for doors and windows. The traditional footing of the timber structures was analysed using Abaqus and was found to be an excellent base isolation system which partly explains the survival of those structures in the past earthquakes. The experimental and numerical results have finally been used to develop a design guideline for new construction as well as recommendations for retrofitting of existing structures for improved performance under seismic lateral load.