Seismic Performance Evaluation of Reinforced Concrete Building Structure Retrofitted with Self-Centering Disc-Slit Damper and Conventional Steel Slit Damper

To meet the recent requirements of low-damage design, there is a growing need to retrofit building structures with a self-centering dissipation system. This system serves a dual purpose: reducing lateral drift and providing supplemental damping to enhance the seismic performance of buildings. This research focuses on assessing the efficiency in seismic response of structures retrofitted with an innovative self-centering hysteretic damper called a Self-Centering Disc Slit Damper (SC-DSD). The SC-DSD consists of four slit dampers and pre-compressed Belleville disc springs that provide self-centering and energy dissipation capabilities. This study investigates the SC-DSD's working mechanism, theoretical formulation, and design method of SC-DSD dampers for their application in multistory building structures. A reinforced concrete (RC) structure is selected as a case study building that is retrofitted with SC-DSDs and conventional slit dampers. Subsequent seismic performance assessments are conducted using detailed pushover to evaluate the global behavior and capacity of the structure used for the design of the damping system. Nonlinear time history analysis is performed to simulate the dynamic behavior of the retrofitted structure under a variety of seismic excitations. This analysis considers a range of ground motion records to capture different intensity levels and frequency content. Comparing these analyses reveals that the designed SC-DSDs effectively reduce seismic responses while minimizing residual displacement up to 95% when contrasted with both the bare structure and the structure retrofitted with conventional steel slit dampers.