Optimal Design of Viscous Dampers for Two and Three-Dimensional Building Structures

Nowadays, passive energy dissipation devices are used widely in many buildings. The current code such as FEMA273/274 is only suggested the equivalent damping ratio of supplemental viscous dampers, but more efficient optimal design of viscous dampers was less mentioned. Although many optimal damper placement methods, have been proposed, these methods could improve the seismic performance of structure efficiently. Some of them contain such complicated procedure that may difficultly apply to practical engineering. Therefore, in this study, we primarily focus on the simple way to find the optimal placement of linear viscous dampers and nonlinear viscous dampers. Existing distribution method will be discussed in this thesis. In addition, the purpose of two distribution methods is proposed by our research group is to make dampers dissipate the maximum energy. Different kinds of optimal damper placement methods such as Simplified Sequential Search Algorithm (SSSA), Element Exchange method (EEM) and distribution methods have been applied to different shear type buildings and three-dimensional asymmetric-plan buildings. Moreover, the results have been examined by ground motion records and artificial ground motions. Finally, statistical methods are used to demonstrate that the applicability of each optimal damper placement method for different kinds of buildings under a series of ground motion records and artificial ground motions.