Vibration Control of the Wind-Excited 76-Story Benchmark Building by Liquid Column Vibration Absorbers

Abstract

A study has been undertaken on the effectiveness of using liquid column vibration absorbers (LCVAs), in the suppression of wind-induced motion of the 76-story benchmark building. Much work has been undertaken on the behavior of the LCVA on an experimental level and its benefits have been demonstrated for wind-induced vibration control on a full-scale communications tower in Sydney, Australia, with a further installation being made on the “One Wall Center Building” Vancouver, Canada. The behavior of the LCVA has also been investigated numerically by use of computational fluid dynamics, and its potential has been illustrated in controlling a five-story building model. In this study, the LCVA adopted is composed of four identical columns of water. Initially, the performance of the LCVA is assessed without the inclusion of additional damping enhancing mechanisms. Subsequently, the same LCVA is considered with the inclusion of orifice plates, allowing a direct comparison of the two strategies. In order to address the issue of robustness, the sensitivity of the LCVA (with and without orifice) to mistuning is examined by perturbing the structural stiffness of the building by +15% and −15%, respectively. From this, an indication of the system performance under conditions of mistuning has been assessed. The performance of the adopted LCVA has also been compared to that of the sample tuned mass damper (TMD) control device. The overall response reductions of the LCVA are shown to be comparable to the TMD. Furthermore, it is shown that the LCVA has several inherent features that make it more attractive than the classical TMD.