Seismic and Time History Performance of RCC Framed Buildings with and without Passive Energy Dissipators

Abstract

Base isolation is an effective way to protect large structures from earthquake damage. It is a costly approach, as the entire structure must be supported on elastomeric or sliding bearings. Viscous dampers distributed throughout an otherwise conventional structure can achieve the same result at a significantly lower cost. Dampers are used to resist lateral forces coming on the structure. Dampers are the energy dissipating devices which also resist displacement of Reinforced Concrete (RC) buildings during an earthquake. These dampers help the structure to reduce buckling of columns thereby increasing the stiffness of the structure. During earthquakes, multi-storeyed buildings get damaged and as a result, large deformation occurs. Dampers reduce vibration and deformation of structural elements during an earthquake. Retrofitting buildings with fluid viscous dampers (FVDs) can improve Interstorey drifts and floor accelerations. In the present study, an RC framed building is modelled and analysed under Southern Sumatra and Chile earthquakes to evaluate the performance of the structure and its elements with and without energy dissipators. For the study, a model (G+19) with and without energy dissipators is modelled in ETABS. The seismic force is applied based on the time history data of the models pertaining to Southern Sumatra and Chile Earthquake. Response Spectrum analysis has been carried out to find the lateral displacements, storey shear and Base shear for the model with and without dampers. The lateral displacement, storey drift, storey shear and Base shear are found to less for the model with Linear FVDs when compared to the model with Non-Linear FVDs and without FVDs.