Abstract
This paper describes a comprehensive computer-aided seismic design approach for both new and existing frame structures equipped with hysteretic dampers. As a matter of fact, despite continuous advancements in the state-of-art demonstrate the effectiveness of these devices in mitigating seismic hazard, nonlinearities involved in the problem and the articulated nature of most of the available design procedures often make them quite difficult to be implemented for real complex structures. To promote widespread use of hysteretic dampers, it is presented a thorough design approach which includes the application of a specific displacement-based design procedure by means of a computer-aided support tool, developed in Visual Basic environment and named DIBRAST. The software is realized to drive the designer through the dissipative system’s design. Required iterations are automated, thus significantly reducing time-processing. As final output, it delivers the damping braces mechanical properties in order to meet a specific performance objective. In order to further support practitioners in geometrical characterization of actual design dampers, authors developed an additional Visual Basic tool, Shear Link Non-Linear Model, able to provide yielding force and elastic stiffness of a specific type of hysteretic device according to its geometry and material. In addition, geometric details of each device can be preliminary determined by means of newly proposed design charts, herein presented, that allow to take into account buckling issue too. Both developed tools are freely available online. A case study is provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed design approach and tools.
Highlights
In recent years, the earthquake engineering research community has made a huge effort to develop structural vibration control systems for seismic hazard mitigation of new or existing structures
This paper has provided a comprehensive computer-aided seismic design procedure for structures equipped with hysteretic devices
As a matter of fact, despite several experimental works in literature highlighting the effectiveness of these devices for seismic hazard mitigation, their employment is not yet widespread due to a lack of design guidelines and prompt methodologies suitable for real structures
Summary
The earthquake engineering research community has made a huge effort to develop structural vibration control systems for seismic hazard mitigation of new or existing structures. Based on non-linear static analysis, Di Cesare and Ponzo (2017) introduced a design approach for the evaluation of the mechanical properties of dissipative systems that are given a target top displacement and are able to regularize strength and stiffness distributions along the height of the braced structure when necessary. In order to promote the diffusion of hysteretic dampers as seismic control strategy for both new and existing structures, the authors believe that the development of a free online design tool, supplied with a user manual, may be decisive It should be applicable, driving practitioners toward the implementation of a design procedure suitable for real applications. After providing input seismic hazard parameters at the site of interest, the tool is able to build the design response spectrum with consideration for the equivalent damping ratio provided by the added hysteretic dissipation system at target displacement.
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