Effect of near and far-field earthquakes on RC bridge with and without damper

Abstract

This paper presents a study on the behavior of an RC bridge under near-field and far-field ground motions. For this purpose, a dynamic nonlinear finite element time history analysis has been conducted. The near-field and far-field records are chosen pairwise from the same events which are fits to the seismic design of the bridge. In order to perform an accurate seismic evaluation, the model has been analyzed under two vertical and horizontal components of ground motions. Parameters of relative displacement, residual displacement, and maximum plastic strain have been considered and compared in terms of nearfield and far-field ground motions. In the following, in order to decrease the undesirable effects of near-field ground motions, a viscous damper is suggested and its effects have been studied. In this case, the results show that the near-field ground motions increase maximum relative and residual displacement respectively up to three and twice times. Significant seismic improvements were achieved by using viscous dampers on the bridge model. Somehow under the considered near-field ground motion, parameters of residual and relative displacement decrease dramatically even less than the model without damper under the far-field record of the same ground motion.