SUMMARYA numerical searching procedure to find the optimum tuning frequency and damping ratio of the tuned-mass damper which can reduce the steady-state response of damped main systems to a minimum level is developed and applied to the two different harmonic excitation sources, support motion of fixed-displacement amplitude and support motion of fixed-acceleration amplitude. The explicit formulae for these optimum parameters are then derived through a sequence of curve-fitting schemes. It has been found that, as the error of the explicit formulae is negligible, they provide a convenient tool to compute the optimum parameters in engineering applications.The numerical results show that the tuned-mass damper is less effective in reducing the system's response when there is a high level of damping incorporated into the system. It is also found that the optimum tuning frequency is strongly influenced by the damping level of a system, especially in regard to the fixed-acceleration support motion, but the optimum damping ratio of the tuned-mass damper is not sensitive to the damping level of a system. The response of the damped system using the undamped optimum value as the damping of the tuned-mass damper is not much different from the response using the damped optimum value.

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SUMMARYBase isolation requires a gap between the base-isolated building and its surroundings to provide space for the deformation of isolation system. Bumping against the surroundings may change the performance of the base-isolated building. In this study, the building is modelled as an elastic or inelastic shear beam and the surroundings is simpliÿed as elastic or inelastic stops. The in uence of stop sti ness, gap size and stop strength on the seismic response is studied. Numerical results indicate that the impact wave induced by the bumping can create an extremely high acceleration response in the shear beam, if the shear beam remains elastic. A non-linearly elastic stop model is observed to reduce the acceleration response. If the shear beam yields, the impact wave cannot propagate through the shear beam and the shear beam remains in the low acceleration response except for the base. Changing the stop sti ness or stop strength has little e ect on the distribution of ductility demand along the shear beam. ? 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.