Seismic Performances of Conventional and LRB-Isolated Buildings Comparing to Seesaw Buildings

Using seesaw structural system equipped with energy dissipating devices has been considered as a low-cost and low-tech way for creation of earthquake-resilient buildings. In this paper by considering three groups of multi-story buildings, including conventional buildings, LRB-based isolated buildings and building with seesaw structure, equipped with a newly introduced type of structural fuses, their seismic performances have been compared through nonlinear time history analyses (NLTHA). The employed fuses in seesaw buildings are a specific type of yielding plate dampers, called Multiple Curved Yielding Plate Energy Dissipater (MCYPED), installed at the bottom of the all circumferential columns of the lowest story of the building. To show the efficiency of the proposed seesaw system in comparison with other two mentioned groups, first, by finite element modeling, verified by experimental results, the initial and secondary stiffness values as well as the yielding and ultimate strengths of the MCYPEDs have been obtained to be modeled by multi-linear plastic springs in the seesaw buildings. Then, a series of NLTHA have been performed on the three groups of buildings by using a set of selected earthquakes. The compared responses include roof displacement and acceleration, base shear, inter-story drift and finally plastic hinges (PHs) formed in the building’s structures. Results show that the proposed seesaw building equipped with MCYPEDs not only results in lower seismic demand, similar to base isolation system, but also leads to remarkable energy dissipation capacity in the building structure at base level, so that the building structure remains basically elastic, and does not need any major repair work, even after large earthquakes, contrary to the conventional building which need to be demolished after the earthquake.