The Earthquake Engineering Online Archive

The influence of base isolation on the seismic response of light secondary equipment

Kelly, James M.

UCB/EERC-81/17, Earthquake Engineering Research Center, University of California, Berkeley, 1982-02, 71 pages (530/K38/1982I)

The seismic response of light secondary systems such as pumps, valves, control devices, and piping systems in a power plant is produced by the response of the primary structural system to seismic ground motion. In a series of experiments designed to evaluate the effect on equipment response of three forms of base isolation systems, a large-scale structural model was subjected to dynamic testing on a shaking table. Each of these systems--a fully isolating system of elastomeric bearings only, a friction-damped system, and a system incorporating bearings and an energy-absorbing device--produced substantial reductions in the seismic response of the secondary structural compoents; each also gave rise to unanticipated behavior

Available online: http://nisee.berkeley.edu/documents/EERC/EERC-81-17.pdf (4 MB)