Optimal placement of viscous fluid dampers in buildings

Abstract

Many different supplemental energy dissipating devices have been proposed to assist in mitigating the harmful effect of seismic Forces on structures. This report presents the result of a study on the optimal placement of fluid viscous dampers in buildings. The report details research that was done on an idealized Ten-storey concrete moment resisting frame structure whose Architectural drawings where drawn using AutoCAD having done a preliminary design to obtain the member sizes. The static analysis design was done using SAP2000 v20. Modal analysis of the structure was carried out using SAP2000 software so as to determine the dynamic properties of the building. The Building Model was then excited with ground acceleration defined by a sine wave of 2sin27t, a wave whose cyclic frequency was close to the natural cyclic frequency of the building. This was done on the building without dampers and on the same model but with 6 different damper placements. Story drift was considered as the main parameter in determining the seismic effect on the building. The placement of Fluid Viscous Dampers indeed reduced the storey drifts. The position of placement didn’t seem to greatly affect the reduction on maximum storey drifts but instead the number of dampers per floor had a significant effect in reducing the storey drifts.