Shaking table investigation of a low-cost and sustainable timber-based energy dissipation system with recentering ability

Abstract

SummaryThe aim of this paper is to demonstrate the efficiency of a low-cost and sustainable timber-based energy dissipation system with recentering ability, which can be used as a seismic isolation system or a tuned mass damper for the seismic protection of structures in developing or developed countries. The system, defined as Dovetail with SPrings (Dove-SP), utilizes the attractive properties of timber to store CO2, thus reducing the carbon footprint of the existing energy dissipation systems: It comprises two timber slabs that are designed to slide against each other in a motion that is restrained by a dovetail sliding joint. Two sliding interfaces that allow this sliding motion at an attractively low friction coefficient are experimentally investigated: A PVC sand-wich (PVC-s) sliding interface, comprising a thin layer of sand that is sand-wiched between two PVC layers and a timber sand-wich sliding interface consisting of a thin layer of sand encapsulated between two beech timber surfaces. A set of low-cost steel springs is designed and installed on both sides of the dovetail joint to recenter the structure back to its original position after the end of an earthquake ground motion excitation. A novel, low-cost and deformable wood material fabricated from delignified balsa wood is used to reduce the pounding effects before the activation of the steel springs. The seismic behavior and the recentering ability of the novel timber-based energy dissipation system subjected to an ensemble of recorded earthquake ground motion excitations was experimentally investigated through a large-scale shaking table investigation at ETH Zurich.

Low-Cost Hybrid Design Strategies: Large-Scale Shaking Table Tests and Challenges of Implementation

“…In case the design requirements for the structure do not allow a residual sliding displacement or the weight of the structure does not allow the recentering by trucks, a recentering system that minimizes this residual sliding displacement has been proposed by ETH Zurich. Tsiavos et al [17] demonstrated through large-scale shaking table tests at ETH Zurich the efficiency of a low-cost and sustainable recentering system based on low-cost steel springs and deformable timber plates [18]. This system, which is based on a 'sandwich' seismic isolation strategy, can be used either as low-cost seismic isolation with recentering or a low-cost tuned mass damper, leading to residual sliding displacement lower than 5mm.…”

Application of Pebbles for Geotechnical Seismic Isolation (GSI): Experimental Parametric Study

“…It is desirable to use materials that are readily found in nature and have large reserves. Several types of materials have been tested and researched for GSI applications, including sand and gravel [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22], sand-bitumen mixtures [23], EPS beads-sand mixtures [24], rubbersoil mixtures (RSMs) gravel-soil mixtures (GRMs) [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44], geosynthetics [45][46][47][48], and geofoam [49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57].…”

Preface for the special issue on geotechnical seismic isolation (GSI)

“…The sliding displacement can be designed to occur within an acceptable range. This GSI mechanism is featured in two articles in this special issue (Banović et al 2022;Tsiavos et al 2022). 3.…”

“…Amongst these, rubber-soil mixtures have been the most researched materials (Bernal-Sanchez et al 2023;Chiaro et al 2022;Dhanya et al 2023; Forcellini and Alzabeebee 2022; Nikitas and Bhattacharya 2023; Vratsikidis and Pitilakis 2022), whilst there is a case study with the use of whole waste tyres (Hazarika et al 2023). Meanwhile, other materials have also been investigated, including EPS beads (Edinçliler and Yildiz 2023), geosynthetics (Banović et al 2022;Dhanya et al 2023), stone pebbles (Banović et al 2022), sand, timber and PVC (Tsiavos et al 2022), polyurethane (Gatto et al 2022), super absorbent polymers (SAP) (Somma and Flora 2023), as well as various high-damping (Aloisio et al 2022) and low-modulus materials (Tsang 2022).…”

“…Laboratory testing of material samples has also been carried out (Dhanya et al 2023;Gatto et al 2022;Hazarika et al 2023;Nikitas and Bhattacharya 2023;Somma and Flora 2023), along with characterising geomaterials at the particle scale (Bernal-Sanchez et al 2023). Shaking table testing (Banović et al 2022;Dhanya et al 2023;Edinçliler and Yildiz 2023;Nikitas and Bhattacharya 2023;Tsiavos et al 2022) and field measurements (Hazarika et al 2023;Vratsikidis and Pitilakis 2022) have been conducted as well. In addition, practical design models and parameters have been proposed for designing GSI systems (Aloisio et al 2022;Somma and Flora 2023;Tsang 2022).…”