An improved ESM-FEM method for seismic control of particle tuned mass damper in MDOF system

Abstract

This study proposes an improved equivalent simplified method coupled with the finite element method (ESM-FEM) to investigate the control performance of the particle tuned mass damper (PTMD) attached to the multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) structure (e.g. transmission tower). To validate the proposed method, the coupled system responses from the ESM-FEM method are compared to the results of the previous study under the free vibration and seismic excitation. The transmission tower is modeled by the FEM in Abaqus, while the PTMD is simulated by the ESM in Python. The damping mechanism of the PTMD-MDOF system is investigated based on the ESM-FEM method, and the PTMD’s control effect is evaluated. Besides, the reliability of the system’s control performance is also discussed. The results show that the ESM-FEM method is reasonable for evaluating the damping performance of the coupled system, and its accuracy is validated by the experimental data and Matlab program. Meanwhile, the proposed method makes it easier to obtain the damping force to further better understand the damping mechanism of the coupled system. Furthermore, the PTMD system has good robustness, and its control performance is less sensitive to unpredictable seismic excitations.