Abstract: In this paper the rocking response of slender/rigid structures stepping on a viscoelastic foundation is revisited. The study examines in depth the motion of the system with a non-linear analysis that complements the linear analysis presented in the past by other investigators. The non-linear formulation combines the fully non-linear equations of motion together with the impulse-momentum equations during impacts. The study shows that the response of the rocking block depends on the size, shape and slenderness of the block, the stiffness and damping of the foundation and the energy loss during impact. The effect of the stiffness and damping of the foundation system along with the influence of the coefficient of restitution during impact is presented in rocking spectra in which the peak values of the response are compared with those of the rigid block rocking on a monolithic base. Various trends of the response are identified. For instance, less slender and smaller blocks have a tendency to separate easier, whereas the smaller the angle of slenderness, the less sensitive the response to the flexibility, damping and coefficient of restitution of the foundation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract: In structural mechanics there are several occasions where a linearized formulation of the original nonlinear problem reduces considerably the computational effort for the response analysis. In a broader sense, a linearized formulation can be viewed as a first-order expansion of the dynamic equilibrium of the system about a 'static' configuration; yet caution should be exercised when identifying the 'correct' static configuration. This paper uses as a case study the rocking response of a rigid block stepping on viscoelastic supports, whose non-linear dynamics is the subject of the companion paper, and elaborates on the challenge of identifying the most appropriate static configuration around which a first-order expansion will produce the most dependable results in each regime of motion. For the regime when the heel of the block separates, a revised set of linearized equations is presented, which is an improvement to the unconservative equations published previously in the literature. The associated eigenvalues demonstrate that the characteristics of the foundation do not affect the rocking motion of the blorck once the heel separates. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract: Earthquake response spectrum is the most popular tool in the seismic analysis and design of structures. In the case of combined primary-secondary (P-S) systems, the response of the supporting P substructure is generally evaluated without considering the S substructure, which in turn is only required to bear displacements and/or forces imposed by the P substructure ("cascade" approach). In doing so, however, dynamic interaction between the P and S components is neglected, and the seismic-induced response of the S substructure may be heavily underestimated or overestimated. In this paper, a novel CQC (Complete Quadratic Combination) rule is proposed for the seismic response of linear light S substructures attached to linear P substructures. The proposed technique overcomes the drawbacks of the cascade approach by including the effects of dynamic interaction and different damping in the substructures directly in the cross-correlation coefficients. The computational effort is reduced by using the eigenproperties of the decoupled substructures and only one earthquake response spectrum for a reference value of the damping ratio.

Abstract: The response of beams resting on viscoelastically damped foundation under moving SDoF oscillators is scrutinized through a novel state-space formulation, in which a number of internal variables is introduced with the aim of representing the frequency-dependent behaviour of the viscoelastic foundation. A suitable single-step scheme is provided for the numerical integration of the equations of motion, and the Dimensional Analysis is applied in order to define the dimensionless combinations of the design parameters that rule the responses of beam and moving oscillator. The effects of boundary conditions, span length and number of modes of the beam, along with those of the mechanical properties of oscillator and foundation, are investigated in a new dimensionless form, and some interesting trends are highlighted. The inaccuracy associated with the use of effective values of stiffness and damping for the viscoelastic foundation, as usual in the present state-of-practice, is also quantified. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract: The use of the advanced censored closure (ACC) technique, recently proposed by the authors for predicting the peak response of linear structures vibrating under random processes, is extended to the case of non-linear oscillators driven by stationary white noise. The proposed approach requires the knowledge of mean upcrossing rate and spectral bandwidth of the response process, which in this paper are estimated through the stochastic averaging method. Numerical applications to oscillators with non-linear stiffness and damping are included, and the results are compared with those given by Monte Carlo simulation and by other approximate formulations available in the literature. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract: Viscoelastic damping devices are effective in mitigating the buffeting response of medium- to high-rise buildings. Their use has the effect of limiting displacements and accelerations, as well as of reducing number and amplitude of fatigue cycles. The structural behaviour, however, is somehow modified, and a standard Kelvin-Voigt model proves to be inaccurate in predicting the dynamic response. For an accurate analysis, in fact, a model able to account for the viscoelastic memory is needed. In this paper, the problem of estimating the fatigue life of structural components of tall buildings provided with viscoelastic dampers is dealt with. A dynamic model of the building in the modal space is established, able to account for the viscoelastic memory, as opposed to the classical modal strain energy method. A cycle counting procedure is then summarised, based on the separation of the dynamic response of the building into a quasi-static and a resonant part. The fatigue life is then evaluated using the well-known Palmgren-Miner rule. An application to a 15-storey building is included, aimed at quantifying the inaccuracies arising when the memory effect is neglected. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract: The correlation coefficients of SDoF oscillators play a fundamental role in the seismic analysis of structures. These coefficients, in fact, are required in order to properly combine the modal maxima in the Lagrangian space, for example via the complete quadratic combination (CQC) rule. In the framework of the random vibration of linear systems, alternative frequency- and time-domain approaches to evaluate the correlation coefficients of SDoF oscillators with viscoelastic memory are presented, and validated by means of Monte Carlo simulation. In contrast to the usual modal strain energy (MSE) method, the proposed formulations allow the seismic analysis of structures with added viscoelastic dampers to be performed in a consistent modal space, where the fading memory arising from these devices is not neglected. Moreover, the frequency content of the ground motion can be accounted for. The numerical applications show that the inaccuracy associated with the conventional analyses (MSE+CQC) may be unacceptable for engineering purposes. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract: The causal and physically realizable Biot hysteretic model proves to be the simplest linear model able to describe the nearly rate-independent behaviour of engineering materials. In this paper, the performance of the Biot hysteretic model is analysed and compared with those of the ideal and causal hysteretic models. The Laguerre polynomial approximation (LPA) method, recently proposed for the time-domain analysis of linear viscoelastic systems, is then summarized and applied to the prediction of the dynamic response of linear hysteretic systems to deterministic and random excitations. The parameters of the LPA model generally need to be computed through numerical integrals; however, when this model is used to approximate the Biot hysteretic model, closed-form expressions can be found. Effective step-by-step procedures are also provided in the paper, which prove to be accurate also for high levels of damping. Finally, the method is applied to the dynamic analysis of a highway embankment excited by deterministic and random ground motions. The results show that in some cases the inaccuracy associated with the use of an equivalent viscous damping model is too large. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract: The paper deals with the problem of predicting the maximum response statistics of Multi-Degree-of-Freedom (MDoF) linear structures subjected to non-stationary non-white noises. The extension of two different censored closures of Gumbel type, originally proposed by the authors for the response of Single-Degree-of-Freedom oscillators, it is presented. The improvement associated with the introduction in the closure of a consistent censorship factor, accounting for the response bandwidth, it is pointed out. Simple and effective step-by-step procedures are formulated and described in details. Numerical applications on a realistic 25-storey moment-resisting frame along with comparisons with classical approximations and Monte Carlo simulations are also included. © 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Abstract: The response of tall buildings to gust buffeting is usually evaluated assuming that the structural damping is of a viscous nature. In addition, when dampers are incorporated in the design to mitigate the response, their effect is allowed for increasing the building modal damping ratios by a quantity corresponding to the additional energy dissipation arising from the presence of the devices. Even though straightforward, this procedure has some degree of inaccuracy due to the existence of a memory effect, associated with the damping mechanism, which is neglected by a viscous model. In this paper a more realistic viscoelastic model is used to evaluate the response to gust buffeting of tall buildings provided with energy dissipation devices. Both cases of viscous and hysteretic inherent damping are considered, while for the dampers a generic viscoelastic behaviour is assumed. The Laguerre Polynomial Approximation is used to write the equations of motion and find the frequency response functions. The procedure is applied to a 25-story building to quantify the memory effects, and the inaccuracy arising when the latter is neglected.

Abstract: The equation of motion of linear dynamic systems with viscoelastic memory is usually expressed in a integrodifferential form, and its numerical solution is computationally heavy. In two recent papers, the writers suggested that the system memory be accounted for through the introduction of a number of additional internal variables. Following this approach, the motion of the system is governed by a set of first-order, linear differential equations, whose solution is quite easy. In this paper, the approach is extended to single-degree-of-freedom systems subjected to random, nonstationary excitation. The equations governing the time variation of the second-order statistics are derived, and an effective step-by-step solution procedure is proposed. Numerical example shows the accuracy of the procedure for white and nonwhite excitations. © ASCE/SEPTEMBER 2004.

Abstract: A dynamic system with memory is a system for which knowledge of the equations of motion, together with the state at a given time instant to is insufficient to predict the evolution of the state at time instants t>to. To calculate the response of systems with memory starting from an initial time instant to, complete knowledge of the history of the system for t<to is needed. This is because the state vector does not contain all the information necessary to fully characterize the state of the system, i.e., the state vector of the system is not complete. In this paper, a state space formulation of viscoelastic systems with memory is proposed, which overcomes the concept of memory by enlarging the state vector with a number of internal variables that bear the information about the previous history of the system. The number of these additional internal variables is in some cases finite, in other cases, it would need to be infinite, and an approximated model has to be used with a finite number of internal variables. First a state space representation of the generalized Maxwell model is shown, then a new state space model is presented in which the relaxation function is approximated with Laguerre polynomials. The accuracy of the two models is shown through numerical examples.