• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.1-20
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• 2008

The dynamic characteristics of the passive, semi-active, and active tuned-liquidcolumn dampers (or TLCDs) are studied in this paper. The design of the latter two are based on the first one. A water-head difference (or simply named as water head in this paper) of a passive TLCD is pre-set to form the so-called semi-active one in this paper. The pre-set of water head is released at a proper time instant during an earthquake excitation in order to enhance the vibration reduction of a structure. Two propellers are installed along a shaft inside and at the center of a passive TLCD to form an active one. These two propellers are driven by a servo-motor controlled by a computer to provide the control force. The seismic responses of a five-story shear building with a passive, semiactive, and active TLCDs are computed for demonstration and discussion. The responses of this building with a tuned mass damper (or TMD) are also included for comparison. The small-scale shaking-table experiments of a pendulum-like system with a passive or active TLCD to harmonic and seismic excitations are conducted for verification.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.620-627
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• 2009

Shaking table test was carried out to obtain dynamic characteristics of TLCDs with uniform and non-uniform sections for both horizontal and vertical tubes. The input to the table is harmonic acceleration with constant magnitude. The output is horizontal dynamic force which is measured by load cell installed below the TLCD. Transfer functions are experimentally obtained using the ratio of input and output. Natural frequency, the most important design factor, is compared to that by theoretical equation for TLCDs with five different water levels. System identification process is performed for experimentally obtained transfer functions to find the dynamic characteristics of head loss coefficient and effective mass of TLCDs. It is found that their magnitudes are larger for a TLCD with non-uniform section than with uniform section and natural frequencies are close to theoretical ones.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.77-93
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• 1998

Some design formulas and design procedures for single and multiple tuned liquid column dampers (TLCDs) are proposed in this study. Previous studies show that if the properties of the TLCD system are properly selected then the TLCD could be as effective as the traditional tuned mass dampers. In addition, the TLCD system offers advantages such as flexibility in terms of installation, little maintenance required, and potentials for multiple usage, etc., which are incomparable by other mechanical types of dampers. In this paper, a set of optimal properties such as length and head loss of a TLCD system are derived under the assumption that the building vibrates in a dominate mode and is subjected to Gaussian white noise excitation. A design procedure for a single TLCD system will be illustrated and discussed. Due to the nonlinearity in the damping term, the TLCD system is sensitive to the loading intensity. This loading sensitivity could limit the application range of the TLCD system. It will be shown in this paper that such a nonlinear effect can be reduced by using multiple TLCDs. As a demonstrative example, the control effects on a flexible building modeled as a single degree-of-freedom system subjected to white noise excitation will be analyzed and discussed using single or multiple TLCDs.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.165-188
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• 2012

In the first part of the paper, the optimal design parameters for tuned liquid column dampers (TLCD) in harmonic pitching motion were investigated. The configurations in design tables include uniform and non-uniform TLCDs with cross-sectional ratios of 0.3, 0.6, 1, 2 and 3 for the design in different situations. A closed-form solution of the structural response was used for performing numerical optimization. The results from optimization indicate that the optimal structural response always occurs when the two resonant peaks along the frequency axis are equal. The optimal frequency tuning ratio, optimal head loss coefficient, the corresponding response and other useful quantities are constructed in design tables as a guideline for practitioners. As the value of the head loss coefficient is only available through experiments, in the second part of the paper, the prediction of head loss coefficients in the form of a design chart are proposed based on a series of large scale tests in pitching base motions, aiming to ease the predicament of lacking the information of head loss for those who wishes to make designs without going through experimentation. A large extent of TLCDs with cross-sectional ratios of 0.3, 0.6, 1, 2 and 3 and orifice blocking ratios ranging from 0%, 20%, 40%, 60% to 80% were inspected by means of a closed-form solution under harmonic base motion for identification. For the convenience of practical use, the corresponding empirical formulas for predicting head loss coefficients of TLCDs in relation to the cross-sectional ratio and the orifice blocking ratio were also proposed. For supplemental information to horizontal base motion, the relation of head loss values versus blocking ratios and the corresponding empirical formulas were also presented in the end.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.435-447
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• 2011

A Computational Fluid Dynamics model is presented in this study for the simulation of the complex fluid flows with free surfaces inside the Tuned Liquid Column Dampers in horizontal motion. The characteristics of the fluid model of the TLCD in horizontal motion include the free surface of the multiphase flow and the horizontal moving frame. In this study, the time depend unsteady Standard ${\kappa}-{\varepsilon}$ turbulent model based on Navier-Stokes equations is chosen. The volume of fluid (VOF) method and sliding mesh technique are adopted to track the free surface of water inside the vertical columns of TLCD and treat the moving boundary of the walls of TLCD in horizontal motion. Several model solution parameters comprising different time steps, mesh sizes, convergence criteria and discretization schemes are examined to establish model parametric independency results. The simulation results are compared with the experimental data in the dimensionless amplitude of the water column in four different configured groups of TLCDs with four different orifice areas. The predicted natural frequencies and the head loss coefficient of TLCDs from CFD model are also compared with the experimental data. The predicted numerical results agree well with the available experimental data.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.71-90
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• 2003

In recent years, high-strength, light-weight materials have been widely used in the construction of high-rise buildings. Such structures generally have flexible, low-damping characteristics. Consequently, wind-induced oscillation greatly affects the structural safety and the comfort of the building's occupants. In this research, wind tunnel experiments were carried out to study the wind-induced vibration of a building with a tuned liquid column damper (TLCD). Then, a model for predicting the aerodynamic response in the across-wind direction was generated. Finally, a computing procedure was developed for the analytical modeling of the structural oscillation in a building with a TLCD under the wind load. The model agrees substantially with the experimental results. Therefore, it may be used to accurately calculate the structural response. Results from this investigation show that the TLCD is more advantageous for reducing the across-wind vibration than the along-wind oscillation. When the across-wind aerodynamic effects are considered, the TLCD more effectively controls the aerodynamic response. Moreover, it is also more useful in suppressing the acceleration than the displacement in biaxial directions. As s result, TLCDs are effective devices for reducing the wind-induced vibration in buildings. Parametric studies have also been conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the TLCD in suppressing the structural oscillation. This study may help engineers to more correctly predict the aerodynamic response of high-rise buildings as well as select the most appropriate TLCDs for reducing the structural vibration under the wind load. It may also improve the understanding of wind-structure interactions and wind resistant designs for high-rise buildings.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.227-240
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• 2000

The study of the optimal damping ratio of a tuned liquid-column damper (or TLCD) attached to a single-degree-of-freedom system is presented. The tuned liquid-column damper is composed of two vertical columns connected by a horizontal section in the bottom and partially filled with water. The ratio of the length of the horizontal section to the effective wetted length of a TLCD considered as another important parameter is also presented for investigation. A simple pendulum-like model test is conducted to simulate a long-period motion in order to prove the effectiveness of TLCD for vibrational control. Comparisons of the experimental and analytic results of the TLCD, TLD (tuned-liquid damper), and TMD (tuned-mass damper) are included for discussion.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.275-281
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• 2015

In this study, vertical motion of a Tuned Liquid Column Damper(TLCD) is measured by a variable voltage measurement system in the electric field and design parameters of the TLCD are determined. First, nonlinear damping term of the TLCD is replaced as the equivalent viscous damping term. The natural frequency and damping ratio of dynamic characteristics of the TLCD are verified. In addition, a novel liquid level measurement system is developed for measuring vertical motion of the TLCD. For the experimental achievement, experimental characterizations of natural frequency and damping ratio of the TLCD are undertaken utilizing the developed variable voltage sensing. Also, shake table testing is performed to determine the dynamic characteristics of the TLCD. As a result, the feasibility of the proposed liquid level measurement system is verified by comparison with the capacitive type wavemeter.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.345-355
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• 2008

This paper presents a design of a tuned liquid mass damper(TLMD) for controlling bi-directional response of high-rise building structure subjected to windload. The proposed damper behaves as a tuned mass damper(TMD) of which mass is regarded as the mass of a tuned liquid column damper(TLCD) and the case wall of the TLCD itself in one direction and the TLCD in the other direction. Because the proposed device has coupled design parameter along two orthogonal directions, it is very important to select designing components by optimal fine tuning. In the designing TLMD, for easy maintenance, the rubber-bearing with small springs was applied in TMD direction. In this study, the Songdo New City Tower 1A in Korea, which has been designed and constructed two TLCDs in order to control bi-directional response, was chosen as the model building structure. The results of rotation test proved the effectiveness of bi-directional behavior of TLMD.