Viscous-fluid-spring damper retrofit of a steel moment frame structure

The subject building is a peculiar pre-Northridge steel moment resisting frame building. Upon investigating the existing lateral resisting system, numerous significant deficiencies were identified; inherent lack of redundancy, poor geometry and inadequate stiffness of the lateral resisting system. All of which resulted in an extremely soft 5-story structure with a primary torsional mode of vibration at T(1)=5.46s. Significant structural modifications were deemed necessary to meet the "life-safety" performance objective as outlined in rehabilitation standards such as ASCE 41. Both increased stiffness and damping were required to adequately retrofit the building. Furthermore, adjacent building separation as well as deformation compatibility issues needed to be addressed and resolved. A three-dimensional computer model of the building was created using ETABS mathematically simulating the building's dynamic characteristics in its current condition. Multiple seismic retrofit systems were investigated such as Buckling Restrained Braced Frames (BRBF's). However, based on the performance effectiveness and constructability of the retrofit schemes studied, the Viscous-Fluid-Spring Damper (VFSD) system was proposed as the "optimum" solution for the building. The VFSD, was chosen because it combines the relatively compact size and minimally invasive constructability with the required properties (an elastomeric spring in parallel with a nonlinear velocity dependent viscous damper). A site-specific response spectrum was developed for the Design Basis Earthquake (DBE, 475 year return period) event, and three pairs of representative earthquake horizontal ground motion time-histories were scaled to match this DBE. The proposed scheme reduced the building maximum inter-story drift ratio from 5.4% to about 1%. Similarly, the maximum roof displacement was reduced by about 70% (23" to 7").