Accelerograph calibration and accelerogram correction

Abstract

AbstractWhen measured earthquake accelerations are used as a basis for structural design, then acceleration errors of a few per cent are usually acceptable. However a number of tasks in structural design, and in earthquake engineering research, require measured accelerations with errors limited to a few parts per thousand. Such tasks include those which call for the calculation of angular accelerations, the comparison of acceleration spectra or the calculation of relative displacementAccurate accelerations may be obtained from existing accelerographs by applying the results of an accurate static calibration to an accelerogram, and then applying corrections for the effects of accelerometer resonance. This paper concentrates attention on the correction of static errors, including sensing direction errors and cross‐axis interaction errors. For completeness there is a brief discussion of dynamic errors, which depend on accelerometer periods and dampings. It is concluded that earthquake accelerations may be obtained with errors of not much more than 0·001 g, the resolution of a typical accelerograph, at least for periods greater than 0·2 sec. When the accelerations have shorter periods, larger errors may arise due to the limited accuracy of the corrections for dynamic errorsThe static calibration of accelerographs, and the corresponding record correction procedures, are illustrated by application to the M.O.2 accelerograph.