• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.63 no.4
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• pp.537-549
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• 2017

One of the main concerns of civil engineering researchers is developing or modifying an energy dissipation system that can effectively control structural vibrations, and keep the structural response within tolerable limits during unpredictable events like earthquakes, wind and any kind of thrust load. This article proposes a new type of mass damper system for controlling wideband earthquake vibrations, called Multiple Wall Dampers (MWD). The basic principle of the Tuned Mass Damper (TMD) was used to design the proposed wall damper system. This passive energy dissipation system does not require additional mass for the damping system because the boundary wall mass of the building was used as a damper mass. The multi-mode approach was applied to determine the location and design parameters of the dampers. The dampers were installed based on the maximum amplitude of modes. To optimize the damper parameters, the multi-objective optimization Response Surface Methodology was used, with frequency response and maximum displacement as the objective functions. The obtained structural responses under different earthquake forces demonstrated that the MWD is one of the most capable tools for reducing the responses of multi-storied buildings, and this system can be practically used for new and existing building structures.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.86 no.4
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• pp.573-587
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• 2023

A conventional tuned mass damper (TMD) provides a passive control option to suppress the structures' wind- or earthquake-induced vibrations. However, excessive displacements of the TMD raise concerns in the practical implementation. Therefore, this study proposes a novel TMD designed for and deployed on a high-rise sightseeing tower. The device consists of an integrated two-way slide rail mount and an eddy current damper (ECD) with a stroke control mechanism. This stroke control mechanism allows the damping coefficient to automatically increase when the stroke reaches a predetermined value, preventing excessive damper displacements during large earthquakes. The corresponding two-stage damping parameters are designed with a variable-thickness copper plate to enable the TMD stroke within a specified range. Thus, this study discusses the detailed design schemes of the device components in TMD. The designed two-stage damping parameters are also numerically verified, and the structural responses with/without the TMD are compared. As seen in the results, the proposed TMD yields effective control authority to limit the acceleration response within a comfort level. In addition, this TMD resolves the spatial availability for the damper movement in high-rise buildings by the controllable damping mechanism.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.665-678
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• 2017

In this paper the tuned mass-damper-inerter (TMDI) is considered for passive vibration control and energy harvesting in harmonically excited structures. The TMDI couples the classical tuned mass-damper (TMD) with a grounded inerter: a two-terminal linear device resisting the relative acceleration of its terminals by a constant of proportionality termed inertance. In this manner, the TMD is endowed with additional inertia, beyond the one offered by the attached mass, without any substantial increase to the overall weight. Closed-form analytical expressions for optimal TMDI parameters, stiffness and damping, given attached mass and inertance are derived by application of Den Hartog's tuning approach to suppress the response amplitude of force and base-acceleration excited single-degree-of-freedom structures. It is analytically shown that the TMDI is more effective from a same mass/weight TMD to suppress vibrations close to the natural frequency of the uncontrolled structure, while it is more robust to detuning effects. Moreover, it is shown that the mass amplification effect of the inerter achieves significant weight reduction for a target/predefined level of vibration suppression in a performance-based oriented design approach compared to the classical TMD. Lastly, the potential of using the TMDI for energy harvesting is explored by substituting the dissipative damper with an electromagnetic motor and assuming that the inertance can vary through the use of a flywheel-based inerter device. It is analytically shown that by reducing the inertance, treated as a mass/inertia-related design parameter not considered in conventional TMD-based energy harvesters, the available power for electric generation increases for fixed attached mass/weight, electromechanical damping, and stiffness properties.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.203-217
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• 2014

Due to the shift in paradigm from passive control to adaptive control, smart tuned mass dampers (STMDs) have received considerable attention for vibration control in tall buildings and bridges. STMDs are superior to tuned mass dampers (TMDs) in reducing the response of the primary structure. Unlike TMDs, STMDs are capable of accommodating the changes in primary structure properties, due to damage or deterioration, by tuning in real time based on a local feedback. In this paper, a novel adaptive-length pendulum (ALP) damper is developed and experimentally verified. Length of the pendulum is adjusted in real time using a shape memory alloy (SMA) wire actuator. This can be achieved in two ways i) by changing the amount of current in the SMA wire actuator or ii) by changing the effective length of current carrying SMA wire. Using an instantaneous frequency tracking algorithm, the dominant frequency of the structure can be tracked from a local feedback signal, then the length of pendulum is adjusted to match the dominant frequency. Effectiveness of the proposed ALP-STMD mechanism, combined with the STFT frequency tracking control algorithm, is verified experimentally on a prototype two-storey shear frame. It has been observed through experimental studies that the ALP-STMD absorbs most of the input energy associated in the vicinity of tuned frequency of the pendulum damper. The reduction of storey displacements up to 80 % when subjected to forced excitation (harmonic and chirp-signal) and a faster decay rate during free vibration is observed in the experiments.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.6 no.2 s.20
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• pp.61-68
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• 2006

In this thesis, a full-scale K shape damper test model was constructed in which a passive vibration control system. This passive vibration control system was incorporated with the use of a newly developed turbulent flow damper sealed by viscoelastic material. A series of tests and earthquake observation has been conducted in this test model. The purpose of the present thesis is to investigate the vibration response characteristics of the building and to verify the effectiveness of the vibration control system. By the static loading test, it was recognized that incorporation of the dampers had little influence on static horizontal stiffness of the building. Free vibration tests revealed that the dampers incorporated increased the damping ratio of the building up to 3 times compared with the undamped case. The effectiveness of the developed vibration control system was confirmed based on the excitation tests and earthquake response observation.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.55-62
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• 2004

In general, control performance of the active control system is superior to that of the passive control devices. However, the active system require a large amount of external energy to operate the actuators. Semi-active control systems maintain the reliability of the passive control systems while taking advantage of the adjustability of the active control system. In this research, a semi-active orificed fluid damper having the capacity of about 2 tons was designed and fabricated. It is a two-stage damper with normally open solenoid valve. A series of tests was performed to grasp its performance characteristics. It was also applied to a 6-story steel structure subjected to random and seismic excitations for the confirmation of its validity on structural vibration absorption.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.81-88
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• 2017

This study deals with the optimal design of a hybrid control system composed of a combination of active control system and passive control system for effective seismic performance improvement of two adjacent structures. The proposed hybrid control system adopts a configuration of installing an active control device in one building and connecting two adjacent structures with a passive control device so that the one-side active control force can be bi-directionally applied to both buildings through the passive connecting devices. In order to derive the optimal performance of the proposed system, the design parameters of the passive and active control systems were searched using the genetic algorithm. Numerical simulations of 10-story and 8-story buildings have been performed to verify the effectiveness of the proposed technique. For the purpose of comparison, the conventional independent control system with two identical active control systems being installed separately for each structure was also optimally designed and its seismic response has been evaluated as well. From the comparative results of the two control systems, it is demonstrated that the proposed hybrid control system requires larger control force for its one-side active control device than the conventional independent control system does for each of both-side active devices, but quite less than the total control force required for both-side devices of the independent control system, while maintaining similar seismic performance. Therefore, the proposed system is more economical and reliable than the conventional independent control system with two identical active devices.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.17-23
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• 2004

The semi-active suspension system is getting widely adopted in passenger vehicles for its ability to improve ride comfort over the passive suspension system while not degrading driving safety. A key to the success is to develop practical controllers that yield performance enhancement over the passive damper under various driving conditions. To this end, several control strategies have been studied and evaluated in this research in consideration of practical aspects such as nonlinearity and dynamics of the damper. From simulation results. it has been observed that, with the proposed control schemes, ride comfort can be significantly upgraded while suppressing degradation of driving safety.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.7 no.8
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• pp.190-198
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• 1999

Continuously controlled semi-active suspension system may improve ride and handling properties. Here, as a mechanism to control the fluid flow solenoid valve mechanism is introduced and added to the basic passive damper to create damping forces of the shock absorbers. The system may produce continuously controlled damping forces in both solenoid valve only and combination with passive shock absorber including fluid flow is studied, and then the combined model is added to the full vehicle model to evaluate its ride and handling performance. Finally, the simulation results are compared to the vehicle models having similar suspension system.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.5 no.5
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• pp.407-422
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• 2002

Passive control of the flutter condition of suspension bridges using a combined vertical and torsional tuned mass damper (TMD) system is presented. The proposed TMD system has two degrees of freedom, which are tuned close to the frequencies corresponding to vertical and torsional symmetric modes of the bridge which get coupled during flutter. The bridge-TMD system is analyzed for finding critical wind speed for flutter using a finite element approach. Thomas Suspension Bridge is analyzed as an illustrative example. The effectiveness of the TMD system in increasing the critical flutter speed of the bridge is investigated through a parametric study. The results of the parametric study led to the optimization of some important parameters such as mass ratio, TMD damping ratio, tuning frequency, and number of TMD systems which provide maximum critical flutter wind speed of the suspension bridge.