Fluid Dampers for Seismic Protection of Woodframe Structures

In the recent past, a large number of steel-flamed buildings have been constructed or retrofitted with supplemental energy dissipation systems for the purpose of seismic protection. However, the application of such systems to woodframe structures has been essentially non-existent except for a limited number of experimental laboratory studies. This paper presents a numerical study of the application of fluid dampers for seismic protection of wood-framed structures. Such dampers dissipate energy via orificing of a fluid. The seismic response of a wood-framed shear wall with and without dampers is evaluated via nonlinear finite element analyses. The results of the analyses demonstrate that the dampers are capable of dissipating a large portion of the seismic input energy while simultaneously relieving the inelastic energy dissipation demand on the shear wall.