Robust Stochastic Design of Viscous Dampers for Base Isolation Applications

Abstract

Over the last decades, there has been a growing interest in the application of base isolation techniques to civil structures. Of the many relevant research topics, the efficient design of additional dampers, to operate in tandem with the isolation system, has emerged as one of the more important. One of the main challenges of such applications has been the explicit consideration of the nonlinear behavior of the isolators or the dampers in the design process. Another challenge has been the efficient control of the dynamic response under near-field ground motions. A framework is discussed in this chapter that addresses both these challenges. A probability logic approach is adopted for addressing the uncertainties about the structural model as well as the variability of future excitations. In this stochastic setting, a realistic model for the description of near-field ground motions is discussed. The design objective is then defined as the maximization of structural reliability. A simulation-based approach is implemented for evaluation of the stochastic performance and an efficient framework is discussed for performing the associated challenging design optimization and for selecting values of the controllable damper parameters that optimize the system reliability.