Stability of laminated rubber bearing and its application to seismic isolation

Abstract

In this paper, the effects of shape factors on the buckling loads in the laminated rubber bearing (LRB) are investigated to guide the design of LRB in determination of the rubber plate thickness and the total rubber height. To substantiate the application of LRB to the seismic isolation of nuclear power plants, the seismic analyses and shaking table tests are carried out for a seismically isolated structure using four LRBs. The parameter equations of seismic isolation frequency are obtained from the shaking table tests and the quasi-static tests of LRB itself to investigate the effects of the LRB characteristics in prediction of maximum peak acceleration responses by analysis. From the comparison of the maximum peak acceleration responses obtained from numerical analyses and experiments, it is verified that the horizontal stiffness variations of LRB should be considered in seismic analysis to get more accurate results.