• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.721-747
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• 2005

The strong need of verifying theories formulated for semi-active control through applications to real structures is due to the fact that theoretical research on semi-active control systems is not matched by a corresponding satisfactory experimental activity. This paper shows how a smart system including magnetorheological devices as damping elements can be implemented in a large-scale structural model, by describing in detail the kind of electronics (dedicated hardware and software) adopted during the experimental campaign. It also describes the most interesting results in terms of reduction of the seismic response (either experimental or numerical) of the semi-actively controlled structure compared to a passive operating control system, and in terms of the evaluation criteria proposed in the benchmark for seismically excited controlled buildings. The paper also explains how to derive from the classical theory of optimal control the adopted control logic, based on a clear physical approach, and provides an exhaustive picture of the time delays characterizing the control sequence.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.39-46
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• 2022

Recently, machine learning is widely used to solve optimization problems in various engineering fields. In this study, machine learning is applied to development of a control algorithm for a smart control device for reduction of seismic responses. For this purpose, Deep Q-network (DQN) out of reinforcement learning algorithms was employed to develop control algorithm. A single degree of freedom (SDOF) structure with a smart tuned mass damper (TMD) was used as an example structure. A smart TMD system was composed of MR (magnetorheological) damper instead of passive damper. Reward design of reinforcement learning mainly affects the control performance of the smart TMD. Various hyper-parameters were investigated to optimize the control performance of DQN-based control algorithm. Usually, decrease of the time step for numerical simulation is desirable to increase the accuracy of simulation results. However, the numerical simulation results presented that decrease of the time step for reward calculation might decrease the control performance of DQN-based control algorithm. Therefore, a proper time step for reward calculation should be selected in a DQN training process.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.1167-1184
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• 2015

Despite considerable life casualty and financial loss resulting from past earthquakes, many existing steel buildings are still seismically vulnerable as they have no lateral resistance or at least need some sort of retrofitting. Passive control methods with decreasing seismic demand and increasing ductility reduce rate of vulnerability of structures against earthquakes. One of the most effective and practical passive control methods is to use a shear panel system working as a ductile fuse in the structure. The shear Panel System, SPS, is located vertically between apex of two chevron braces and the flange of the floor beam. Seismic energy is highly dissipated through shear yielding of shear panel web while other elements of the structure remain almost elastic. In this paper, lateral behavior and related benefits of this system with narrow-flange link beams is experimentally investigated in chevron braced simple steel frames. For this purpose, five specimens with IPE (narrow-flange I section) shear panels were examined. All of the specimens showed high ductility and dissipated almost all input energy imposed to the structure. For example, maximum SPS shear distortion of 0.128-0.156 rad, overall ductility of 5.3-7.2, response modification factor of 7.1-11.2, and finally maximum equivalent viscous damping ratio of 35.5-40.2% in the last loading cycle corresponding to an average damping ratio of 26.7-30.6% were obtained. It was also shown that the beam, columns and braces remained elastic as expected. Considering this fact, by just changing the probably damaged shear panel pieces after earthquake, the structure can still be continuously used as another benefit of this proposed retrofitting system without the need to change the floor beam.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.21-36
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• 2023

Structural vibrations generated by earthquakes and wind loads can be controlled by varying the structural parameters such as mass, stiffness, damping ratio, and geometry and providing a certain amount of passive or active reaction forces. A Double-Tuned Mass Dampers (DTMDs) system, which is simple and more effective than the conventional single tuned mass damper (TMD) system for vibration mitigation is presented. Two TMDs tuned to the first two natural frequencies were used to control vibrations. Experimental investigations were carried out on a three degrees-of-freedom frame model to investigate the effectiveness of DTMDs systems in controlling displacements, accelerations, and base shear. Numerical models were developed and validated against the experimental results. The validation showed a good match between the experimental and numerical results. The validated model was employed to investigate the behavior of a five degrees-of-freedom shear building structure, wherein mass dampers with different mass ratios were considered. The effectiveness of the DTMDs system was investigated for harmonic, seismic, and white noise base excitations. The proposed system was capable of significantly reducing the story displacements, accelerations, and base shears at the first and second natural frequencies, as compared to conventional single TMD.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.62 no.2
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• pp.197-208
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• 2017

Among various retrofitting strategies, use of semi-active control for retrofitting a building structure has gained momentum in recent years. One of the techniques for such retrofitting is to connect a weaker building to an adjacent stronger building by semi-active devices, so that performances of a weaker building are significantly improved for seismic forces. In this paper, a ten storey weaker building is connected to an adjacent stronger building using magneto-rheological (MR) dampers, for primarily improving the performance of the weaker building in terms of displacement, drift and base shear. For this, a fuzzy logic controller is specifically developed by fuzzyfying the responses of the coupled system. The performance of the control strategy is compared with the passive-on and passive-off controls. Pounding Mitigation between the two buildings is also investigated using all three control strategies. The results show that there exists a fundamental frequency ratio between the two buildings for which maximum control of the weaker building response takes place with no penalty on the stronger building. There exists also a fundamental frequency ratio where control of the weaker building response is achieved at the expense of the amplification of the stronger building. However, coupling strategy always improves the possibility of pounding mitigation.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.37-49
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• 1998

Research and a, pp.ication of earthquake protection system in Taiwan have become very active since about ten years ago. Many passive isolators, etc., have been studied extensively. These studies have resulted in a few practical a, pp.ications and proposals of two draft design provisions for seismic isolation design of bridges and buildings. In addition to the pass control, analytical studies on active semi-active control have also been very active and the experimental studies have scheduled in the near future. This paper summarise the progress on recent research and a, pp.ication of earthquake protection systems in Taiwan. The emphases are given to the control systems that have been a, pp.ied in practical a, pp.ications.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.301-308
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• 2018

This paper presents an optimal design method of a hybrid structural control system considering multi-hazard. Unlike a typical structural control system in which one system is designed for one specific type of hazard, a simultaneous optimal design method for both active and passive control systems is proposed for the mitigation of seismic and wind induced vibration responses of structures. As a numerical example, an optimal design problem is illustrated for a hybrid mass damper(HMD) and 30 viscous dampers which are installed on a 30 story building structure. In order to solve the optimization problem, a self-adaptive Harmony Search(HS) algorithm is adopted. Harmony Search algorithm is one of the meta-heuristic evolutionary methods for the global optimization, which mimics the human player's tuning process of musical instruments. A self-adaptive, dynamic parameter adjustment algorithm is also utilized for the purpose of broad search and fast convergence. The optimization results shows that the performance and effectiveness of the proposed system is superior with respect to a reference hybrid system in which the active and passive systems are independently optimized.

• International Journal of Concrete Structures and Materials
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.89-118
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• 2015

The geometric nonlinearity of off-diagonal bracing system (ODBS) could be a complementary system to covering and extending the nonlinearity of reinforced concrete material. Finite element modeling is performed for flexural frame, x-braced frame and the ODBS braced frame system at the initial phase. Then the different models are investigated along various analyses. According to the experimental results of flexural and x-braced frame, the verification is done. Analytical assessments are performed in according to three dimensional finite element modeling. Nonlinear static analysis is considered to obtain performance level and seismic behaviour, and then the response modification factors calculated from each model's pushover curve. In the next phase, the evaluation of cracks observed in the finite element models, especially for RC members of all three systems is performed. The finite element assessment is performed on engendered cracks in ODBS braced frame for various time steps. The nonlinear dynamic time history analysis accomplished in different stories models for three records of Elcentro, Naghan and Tabas earthquake accelerograms. Dynamic analysis is performed after scaling accelerogram on each type of flexural frame, x-braced frame and ODBS braced frame one by one. The base-point on RC frame is considered to investigate proportional displacement under each record. Hysteresis curves are assessed along continuing this study. The equivalent viscous damping for ODBS system is estimated in according to references. Results in each section show the ODBS system has an acceptable seismic behaviour and their conclusions have been converged when the ODBS system is utilized in reinforced concrete frame.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.349-358
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• 2019

Long span cable-stayed bridges are extremely vulnerable to dynamic excitations such as which caused by traffic load, wind and earthquake. Studies on cable-stayed bridge vibration control have been keenly interested by researchers and engineers in design new bridges and assessing in-service bridges. In this paper, a novel Hybrid-Tuned Mass Damper (H-TMD) is proposed and a hybrid control model named Mixed Logic Dynamic (MLD) is employed to build the bridge-H-TMD system to mitigate the vibrations. Firstly, the fundamental theory and modeling process of MLD model is introduced. After that, a new state switching design of the H-TMD and state space equations for different states are proposed to control the bridge vibrations. As the state switching designation presented, the H-TMDs can applied active force to bridge only if the structural responses are beyond the limited thresholds, otherwise, the vibrations can be reduced by passive components of dampers without active control forces provided. A new MLD model including both passive and active control states is built based on the MLD model theory and the state switching design of H-TMD. Then, the case study is presented to demonstrate the proposed methodology. In the case study, the control scheme with H-TMDs is applied for a long span cable-stayed bridge, and the MLD model is established and simulated with earthquake excitation. The simulation results reveal that the suggested method has a well damping effect and the established system can be switched between different control states as design excellently. Finally, the energy consumptions of H-TMD schemes are compared with that of Active Tuned Mass Damper (ATMD) schemes under variable seismic wave excitations. The compared results show that the proposed H-TMD can save energy than ATMD.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.58-65
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• 2016

Various passive energy dissipation systems have been proposed and widely applied to real building structures under seismic load due to their high energy-dissipation potential and low cost for installation and maintenance. This paper presents nonlinear dynamic analysis results of the effectiveness of exterior-installed Kagome damping system(EKDS) in passively reducing seismic response. Kagome damping system proposed by previous studies has isotropic and bi-linear hysteretic characteristics and the installation configuration is newly presented in this study. The 15 and 20 story RC framed apartment buildings are used for verifying the effectiveness of the EKDS. The stiffness ratio of the damper supporting column to the original building, the number of the dampers, and the installed stories were considered as design parameters. Numerical results demonstrated that the EKDS were very effective in reducing both the two horizontal directional seismic responses by just using smaller number of exterior-installed damping system when compared to the traditional one-directional inter-story installed damping systems.