Seismic Performance of a Piezoelectric Friction Damper in Reducing the Peak Response of a 1/4-Scaled Steel Frame Building

Abstract

A previously proposed semi-active control algorithm was employed to drive a prototype piezoelectric friction damper, which was installed on the first story of a ¼ scale, 3-story building model. The performance of the damper and the simple semiactive control strategy were evaluated both numerically and experimentally under four modified earthquake ground motion records of various amplitudes. The seismic effectiveness and adaptability of the algorithm as well as the e ffect of damper saturation on structural responses were investigated. Numerical simulations agree well with the experimental results. The proposed control strategy not only effectively suppresses the structural vibration but also is adaptive to varying exc itations from weak to strong earthquakes. Experimental results indicate that a piezoelectric friction damper with slight saturation could be advantageous to the seismic mitigation of buildings. However, significant saturation will degrade the performance o f the semiactive control strategy.