The Earthquake Engineering Online Archive

Mechanical characteristics of Neoprene isolation bearings

Kelly, James M.; Quiroz, Edgardo

UCB/EERC-92/11, Earthquake Engineering Research Center, University of California, Berkeley, 1992-08, 127 pages (525/K44/1992)

This report evaluates the mechanical characteristics of polychloroprene rubber (Neoprene) bearings under dynamic loading and determines their maximum shear capacity and failure mechanism. It is demonstrated that, with properly designed and manufactured isolators, it is possible to ensure that the isolation system does not fail before the structure above it fails. Thus, although the failure of a base-isolated structure means the failure of the structural frame (as in a conventional structure), the input level of earthquake motion that is needed to produce this failure is very much larger than that required to cause failure in a conventionally based frame.

Available online: http://nisee.berkeley.edu/documents/EERC/EERC-92-11.pdf (9 MB)