Abstract
A new damping shear wall system is proposed to improve the seismic performance of building structures. A steel damper in the proposed damping system is installed in the bottom slit horizontally of the shear wall aiming to dissipate energy during earthquakes and prevent damage of the structure, which could not only provide good seismic performance but could also easily repaired after an earthquake. The main feature of this system is that plastic deformation is limited to the steel dampers at the bottom of walls. The seismic performance of the proposed damping system was verified through cyclic tests of seven full-scale wall structures that had steel dampers. Tests were conducted to simulate the effect of aftershocks which can cause additional damage to already weakened structures after an earthquake. Based on the test results, the cyclic performance of damping shear wall systems was discussed with emphasis on the energy dissipation capacity.