Suspended Columns for Seismic Isolation in Structures (SCSI):Experimental and numerical studies

Abstract

In this paper, a modified and improved seismic isolation system called suspension columns for seismic isolation was investigated. An experimental study of the proposed isolation method, together with theoretical and numerical analyses, has thoroughly been conducted. In the proposed method, during the construction of the foundation, some cavities are created at the position of the columns inside the foundation and the columns are placed inside the cavities and hanged from the foundation by flexible cables rather being directly connected to the foundation. Since the columns are suspended and due to the gap between the columns and walls of the cavities, the structure is able to move freely to each side thus, the transmitted seismic actions are reduced. The main parameter of this isolation technique is the length of the suspension cable. As the cable length is changed, the natural frequency of the structure is also changed, thus, the desired frequency can be achieved by means of an appropriate cable length. As the experimental phase of the study, a steel frame structure with two floors was constructed and subjected to the acceleration of three earthquakes using a shaking table with different hanging cable lengths. The structural responses were recorded in terms of acceleration and relative displacement. The experimental results were compared to the theoretical and numerical ones, obtained from the MATLAB programming and the finite element software ABAQUS, showing a suitable agreement between them. The results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed isolation method in reducing the seismic effects on the structure.