Engineering Structures 30 (2008) 27392751

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Engineering Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/engstruct

An innovative earthquake isolation system using fibre reinforced rubber bearings

Andrea Mordini a,,1 , Alfred Strauss b
a VCE Vienna Consulting Engineers, Hadikgasse 60, 1140 Vienna, Austria b University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences, Department of Civil Engineering + Natural Hazards, Institute for Structural Engineering, Peter Jordan Strasse 82,

1090 Vienna, Austria

article

info

a b s t r a c t
In this contribution, a new innovative isolation system for structures in earthquake regions is presented. The system consists of high damping rubber bearings strengthened with glass fibre fabrics. A wide parametric numerical investigation through Finite Element Analysis is carried out in order to develop and verify analytical models for these new isolation devices. Experimental investigations provided useful information for numerical modelling and derivation of analytical approaches. Comparisons with simplified formulations are reported as well. In order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed solution and to verify the reliability of the numerical simulations, the new devices are applied to the seismic analysis of a liquid storage tank, a strategic structure for civil protection. 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Article history: Received 8 March 2007 Received in revised form 26 February 2008 Accepted 17 March 2008 Available online 28 April 2008 Keywords: Fibre reinforced rubber bearings Isolated structures Liquid storage tanks Seismic protection Petrochemical facilities

1. Introduction Rubber bearings, in different versions with interposed steel plates, have been used extensively in bridge superstructures as they are able to carry large vertical loads and provide only small resistance to lateral displacements. More recently, their use has been extended to seismic isolation of buildings and structures [1, 2]. During the last decades new models of isolators have been investigated and developed, these contain interposed fibre layers, e.g. glass or carbon fibres, instead of classical steel plates [3 11]. This contribution focuses on such bearings strengthened with fibres instead of steel plates. The first part of this study describes the numerical investigation of the bearing in order to find out its mechanical behaviour both in static and dynamic simulations. For this reason, a parametric analysis is performed varying specimen size, vertical load, glass fibre layer number, boundary conditions and material constitutive models. The results of three experimental campaigns are briefly presented. The experimental tests provided the authors with important information about material properties, damping capabilities, boundary conditions and connection between rubber and fabric layers. The computational demand for analyzing a full three-dimensional bearing model is very high because of the huge number

of elements required, the material and geometric non-linearity, and the iterations in the non-linear time history simulation with direct integration. Consequently, including bearings in the analysis of engineering structures seems to be impossible with the current computational resources. Therefore, an alternative way is proposed in order to include the bearings in the full-scale analysis of structures. 2. Modelling techniques The investigated Fibre Reinforced Rubber Bearings are made of a rubber body with embedded glass fibre layers. An extensive parametric numerical program is performed with the commercial Finite Element (FE) code ABAQUS [12]. The simulated bearings differ in size, number of layers and material properties: the 150 150 50 small-scale bearing (with 12 fibre layers and shear modulus 0.45 MPa), the 245 245 80 mock-up bearings (with 7 or 13 fibre layers and shear modulus 0.45 or 1.02 MPa) and the 490 490 150 full-scale bearing (with 12, 18 or 24 fibre layers and shear modulus 0.45 or 1.02 MPa). Modelling characteristics and assumptions of the specimen 490 490 150 are illustrated in Fig. 1. The number of analyses for each case depends on the vertical load, how this is done is explained in the following paragraph. The proposed simulation method provides an all-around knowledge of the parameters influencing the bearings. 2.1. Materials: Rubber and fabric The material model describing the rubber has to fulfill a nearly incompressible behaviour. Therefore, the hyperelastic Neo Hooke

Corresponding author.
E-mail address: andrea@andreamordini.com (A. Mordini). 1 When the work was done: University of Parma, Department of Civil Engineering, Via P.G. Usberti 181/A, 43100 Parma, Italy. 0141-0296/$ see front matter 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.engstruct.2008.03.010

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Fig. 1. Modelling assumptions for the 490 490 150 specimen.

formulation is used where two parameters are required, namely the bulk modulus K and the shear modulus G. Both moduli can be obtained by special test procedures. The analyses are performed with a constant value of the bulk modulus K = 2000 MPa and with two different values of the shear modulus G = 0.45 and 1.02 MPa. The bulk modulus can be kept constant according to data achieved by experiments, since a change of ten times in the modulus is required to cause remarkable changes in the bearing response. The shear modulus G, in general, is given by production information at 100% horizontal stretch. In this work, the hyperelastic material behaviour is also described by the Odgen model, an empirical approach which allows the use of experimental load-displacement curves. Eq. (1) provides the strain energy potential for the Ogden formulation inserted in ABAQUS:
N

2.2. Elements and meshes Since rubber is a nearly incompressible material, the FE mesh is designed with elements allowing a hybrid formulation. The specimens are considered in the first step as 3D domains. Thus, the 8-node 3D solid elements with hybrid formulation C3D8H are used. Three solid elements are used to model the rubber between the fibre layers (Fig. 1). The glass fabric layers are modelled with the 4-node membrane elements M3D4 sharing their nodes with the rubber elements. Perfect bond is assumed between rubber and fabric after the experimental verification in small-scale tests and peel tests according to [14,15]. Because of its symmetry only the half specimen is modelled. In a further step, the specimens are considered as a 2D domain. Since this procedure can be treated as a simple transformation from 3D to 2D, the 8-node 3D solid elements become the 4-node 2D plane strain hybrid formulation CPE4H elements, and the 4-node membrane elements become the 2-node linear truss elements T2D2. 2.3. Loads To investigate the bearing behaviour, a specific loading program has been worked out. The static analyses are performed in two steps. In the first (load control), a vertical loading is applied up to a stress of about 8.30 MPa in the rubber. This loading process is stopped at several different levels (5 for the small-scale and mock-up specimens, 8 for the full-scale specimen) and, in the second step (displacement control), a horizontal displacement until 150% of shear deformation is applied keeping the vertical load constant. During these loading procedures, the vertical (Kv ) and horizontal (Kh ) stiffnesses are recorded as functions of the vertical and horizontal displacements. A total number of 81 static analyses are performed. In the dynamic analyses, a mass is anchored to the upper bearing surface and an acceleration time history is applied to the bottom surface. For static analyses only a 3D model is employed while, for dynamic analyses, both 2D and 3D models are compared. 2.4. Experimental investigations Three different experimental campaigns were carried out within the same project. The first series, including both shear and uniaxial tests, was performed on pure rubber. Shear tests were done on rubber discs with diameter of 25 mm and thickness of

U=
i=1

2i

1 i + 2 i + 3 i 3 +
1

N i=1

1
Di

(Jel 1)2i ,

(1)

where i = J 3 i , J is the total volume strain, i is the ith principal strain, Jel is the elastic volume strain, Di are temperature-dependent material parameters determining the material compressibility and i and i are material parameters. In order to consider the curvature of the results, the relaxation and creep effects, N = 4 is used, which leads to a total of 8 parameters. This constitutive model is applied to the full-scale bearing only. The parameters are obtained by fitting the experimental data as explained below. Two main concepts can be adopted in order to model reinforcements in a rubber matrix, the discrete and the smeared approach. The former, suitable both for 2D and 3D modelling, considers each group of fibres as a truss embedded in the rubber matrix. The advantage of this method is that a non-linear material law can be assigned to each element whereas, a disadvantage is that each element has to be located singularly in the matrix and connected to it by numerical restraints leading to huge modelling efforts. Using a smeared concept, on the other hand, means describing the fabric as a continuous sheet with an equivalent cross-sectional area. Membrane elements are used in 3D models and truss elements in 2D. A detailed study of these different modelling procedures was performed in preliminary analyses and their influence on the numerical results can be neglected. Therefore, the glass fibre layers with crossed fibres parallel-oriented to the specimen sides are described as continuous sheets with an average thickness of 0.3 mm. The layers are modelled as a linear elastic orthotropic material with elastic modulus E = 210 000 MPa in the main directions and zero in-plane Poisson coefficient.

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Fig. 2. CFRB (a) and GFRB (b) during the testing procedures. The GFRB is subjected to 155 kN compression load and 100 mm shear displacement.

Fig. 3. Fibre fabrics used in the bearings: bi-directional carbon fibre fabric (a) and twisted bi-directional glass fibre fabric (b). Table 1 Rubber parameters for Ogden formulation
K1 = 2000 MPa K2 = K3 = K4 = 0

1 = 4.346

1 = 2.252

2 = 11.880

2 = 0.528

3 = 10.696

3 = 1.573

4 = 4.922

4 = 0.337

6 mm. The shear modulus was obtained from the chord modulus results of cyclic shear tests at different strains. Uniaxial tests were done on dumbbell specimens obtaining the nominal stress against the stretch. In order to obtain the required material parameters, the experimental data for uniaxial tension and shear tests was fitted to the Ogden model. To the knowledge of the authors, uniaxial tests along with shear data has not been used before for this purpose. The fitting procedure was performed by using a numerical optimization toolbox and the MaquardtLevenberg algorithm. The resulting parameters for the Ogden formulation are reported in Table 1. Additional information is given in [13]. The second series of tests was performed on a 150 150 50 Carbon Fibre Reinforced Bearing (CFRB) with 12 carbon fibre layers (Fig. 2-a) since at first attempt carbon fibres were adopted. The experimental test was performed in two different steps. In the first, a vertical load was applied on the bearing (load control); subsequently, a 100% shear displacement was applied keeping the vertical load (displacement control) constant. The same procedure was also applied to the numerical model. During the test procedures, some debonding problems were observed between the carbon fibres and the rubber matrix. The reason for this behaviour was identified to be chemical. In particular, the rubber did not react well with the epoxy resin used on the carbon surface. Subsequently, different fabrics were tested and finally, a perfect bond was established by using glass fibres. For this reason a perfect bond is used later in the numerical modes. Fig. 3 shows the two different fabrics and their characteristics. The carbon fibre fabric has elastic modulus 210 000 MPa and mass per

unit area 160 g/m2 while the glass fibre fabric has elastic modulus 70 000 MPa and mass per unit area 250 g/m2 . The third series of tests was focused on a 245 245 80 mock-up Glass Fibre Reinforced Bearing (GFRB) subjected to a vertical load and shear displacements (Fig. 2-b). Fig. 4 shows the experimental outcomes corresponding to two different test steps. Fig. 4-a corresponds to a vertical load of 155 kN and a horizontal displacement of 100 mm while Fig. 4-b shows the load displacement response to an earthquake simulation. The horizontal stiffness and the damping ratio are computed as
Kh = Fmax Fmin dmax dmin

and =

2H

Kh (dmax dmin )2

(2)

respectively, where H is the hysteresis area. The bearing behaviour is influenced by the vertical loading, the horizontal displacement and its frequency. In all the experimental tests, a rolling over effect on the specimen borders was observed (Fig. 2). The numerical modelling of this phenomenon is discussed later. It has to be mentioned that the damping values obtained correspond to the production specifications. This means that the bearing can effectively provide an isolated structure with the desiderate target damping. 3. Derivation of the analytical approach From now on, the numerical analyses regarding the full-scale bearing with 24 fibre layers and shear modulus 0.45 MPa will be

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Fig. 4. Loaddisplacement behaviour of the GFRB mock-up bearing under a vertical load of 155 kN and a horizontal displacement of 100 mm (a). Load displacement behaviour of the GFRB mock-up bearing under a simulated the earthquake loading (b).

Fig. 5. Deformed mesh (half specimen) under vertical load of the 490 490 150 bearing (a) and detail of the retaining effect of the layers (b). Table 2 Parameters for stiffness analytical fitting (Neo Hooke model) 490 490 150, 24 layers, G = 0.45 MPa, Neo Hooke
ai bi ci di ei fi

Vertical stiffness Kv (N/mm) Horizontal stiffness Kh (N/mm)

970 320.70 697.83

43 325.91 35.67

2205.81
0.48

207.70 0.23

11 576.66 9.31

2.81 0.002

Table 3 Parameters for stiffness analytical fitting (Ogden model) 490 490 150, 24 layers, Ogden
ai bi ci di ei fi

Vertical stiffness Kv (N/mm) Horizontal stiffness Kh (N/mm)

1075 210.75 1031.12

105 624.61 71.33

3659.37 1.56

639.56 0.38

40 057.49 8.23

3.17 0.0003

presented and discussed. The complete work which also includes the other specimens is reported in [16]. 3.1. Analytical description of stiffness As already mentioned, the static analyses are performed in two steps. The first is a compression step and the second is a shear displacement step with constant vertical load. Fig. 5-a shows the deformed mesh at the end of the compression step. The retaining effect of the fibre layers on the rubber can be clearly seen (Fig. 5-b). The vertical and horizontal stiffness from FE analyses are fitted by analytical second order polynomial surfaces as functions of the vertical and horizontal displacements:
Kv = a1 + b1 v + c1 w + d1 vw + e1 v2 + f1 w2 Kh = a2 + b2 v + c2 w + d2 vw + e2 v2 + f2 w2

[N/mm].

(3)

In Eq. (3), v and w represent the vertical and the shear displacements [mm] respectively and ai to fi the surface parameters. The parameters obtained from analytical fitting are reported in Tables 2 and 3 for the two rubber models. The stiffness represented in Eq. (3) is a secant stiffness obtained from the numerical calculation by

dividing the vertical and horizontal forces by the relative displacements. In Figs. 6 and 7 the numerical results and fitting surfaces are depicted for both Neo Hooke and Ogden models. The higher curves correspond to less shear deformation while the lower curves correspond to higher shear deformation. It is easy to recognize that the Ogden model provides a higher stiffness. For a better understanding of the graphs, it must be underlined that the initial G modulus of the Ogden model is G0 = 0.608 MPa and it decreases with the shear deformation to G = 0.45 MPa. In contrast, the Neo Hooke model works with a constant value of G = 0.45 MPa. Both models have a constant bulk modulus K = 2000 MPa. It must also be mentioned that the effect of the bulk modulus K is higher on the vertical stiffness while the effect of shear modulus G is higher on the horizontal stiffness. By comparing the two models, it can be seen that there are no significant divergences in the vertical stiffness Kv since the bulk modulus is constant for both models. The initial G difference is shown by the discrepancy between upper curves. As the shear deformation increases, the G modulus in the Ogden formulation gets closer to G = 0.45 MPa and the curves approach each other (Figs. 6-a and 7-a). In the Kh graph a strong dependence on G can be seen. In fact, there is a great difference

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Fig. 6. Vertical (a) and horizontal (b) stiffness fitting for the Neo Hooke model.

Fig. 7. Vertical (a) and horizontal (b) stiffness fitting for the Ogden model.

Fig. 8. Lateral view of the deformed mesh with constrained (a) and free edges (b).

between the curves for low shear deformation as the Ogden initial modulus is G0 = 0.608 MPa, then it gets closer to G = 0.45 MPa and the curves also get closer to each other (Figs. 6-b and 7-b). Since the FE modelling of bearings requires a high computational effort, an alternative way to include them in the dynamic analysis of full-scale structures like bridges or petrochemical tanks is used. The analytical laws (3) can be assigned to connector elements in order to replace each bearing by a single element. These elements in fact, can be used to model a spring with non-linear stiffness as a function of two variables. In the second part of this contribution, this modelling technique is applied to the FE analysis of a liquid storage tank. 3.2. Effects of boundary conditions on bearing behaviour One of the advantages in using this type of bearings is to put them in place without a constraint system such as anchor plates. Therefore, the connection with the superposed structure is realized only by friction. As the shear displacement increases, the bearing edges can leave their initial plane and move in the vertical direction with a rolling over effect. This behaviour was observed also in the experimental tests (Fig. 2). Big efforts are made to capture realistic interface conditions between the bearing and the loading surface. In order to study this behaviour, a preliminary investigation was performed with two different FE models. In the first, the specimen edges were constrained to remain in their plane (Fig. 8-a) whereas in the

second they were allowed to move up and down (Fig. 8-b). Therefore, the occurrence of the rolling over effect for high shear displacement could be described well by the FE model but requires a high computational effort involving contact modelling. The comparison between the two models showed that the difference in the horizontal stiffness increases as the shear displacement increases. However, in the range of displacements expected for this bearing, the difference is negligible. Moreover, as already said, the modelling of the free edge conditions requires a higher computational time. For these reasons, the constrained edge approximation is preferred and in the numerical analysis the simplified model with vertical constrained boundary conditions is used. 4. Verification of simple analytical formulations The huge amount of data derived from the parametric numerical analyses can be used for comparison with simple analytical rules. These formulations were originally written for steel plate elastomeric bearings but they were chosen because, although very simple, they are of immediate application even with manual calculations. In this way, we can evaluate whether, for the purpose of practical engineering applications, these methods maintain their validity in case of fibre reinforced bearings. 4.1. Theoretical models of stiffness The vertical displacement of a bearing is due to rubber bulging (with shear strain in rubber) and volume change in rubber [1,2].

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Fig. 9. Overlapped area.

Fig. 11. Result comparison for horizontal stiffness plotted against the shear displacement.

Therefore, the vertical stiffness can be treated as a seriescombination and written as

Kv = Kv ( ) + Kv (V ) A h Kv ( ) Kv (V )

4.2. Theoretical models of stresses Fabric layers work as a constraint for lateral rubber deformation and therefore, they are subjected to biaxial tension during both compression and shear steps. Since the woven fabric has no shear stiffness, the layers are not subjected to shear stress in their plane. The fabric allowable stress has a direct effect on the bearing allowable vertical load [17]:
Fv max Ayielding tfibre

Kv ( ) = 6.73GS

2A

(4)

and Kv (V ) = K

where K is the rubber bulk modulus, G is the rubber shear modulus, A is the bearing horizontal overlapped area, h is the bearing height L with L bearing and S is the shape factor. For square bearings, S = 4 t side and t distance between layers. In order to take into account the effective working area during the Shear step, the overlapped area is obtained as A = L(L w), where w is the shear displacement (Fig. 9). For the analytical formulation of the horizontal stiffness, the bearing can be considered as a vertical shear beam, which yields:
Kh = G A h

2.6

trubber

(6)

(5)

Eq. (5) fits very well in case of rigid steel plates that inhibit flexural deformation. Using the above mentioned analytical laws, a comparative study between analytical and numerical results is performed. Figs. 10 and 11 show the comparison between the results from the FE calculation and the analytical formulations of Eqs. (4) and (5) for a vertical load of 2000 kN. It can be immediately seen that the agreement with the vertical stiffness is very high. The analytical and numerical results with respect to both vertical and shear displacements are contained in a small range of variability. In contrast, the numerical and analytical description of the horizontal stiffness provides different results as the shear displacement increases. This could probably be due to the extremely simplyfied formulation of Eq. (5).

where Fv max is the maximum vertical load, A is the bearing horizontal area, yielding is the yielding stress for layers, trubber is the distance between layers and tfibre is the layer thickness. By using the maximum allowable tensile stress of 250 MPa (safety margin included) for the fabric, the maximum vertical load based on Eq. (6) results in 1230 kN for the bearing 490 490 150, 24 layers, G = 0.45 MPa. In order to compare the results from Eq. (6) with those from the FE analyses, the equation can be rewritten as

fibres =

2.6Fv trubber
A tfibre

(7)

with obvious meaning of the symbols. Increasing the shear displacement, the stress increases in those zones still subjected to the load. In order to take into account this effect, during the shear step, the same formulation can be used with the overlapped area instead of the total one (Fig. 9). Fig. 12 shows the stresses in the fabrics as a function of the applied vertical load for two FE analyses (G = 0.45 MPa and G = 1.02 MPa) and for Eq. (7). In both cases, the FE stresses in the fabrics are smaller and in general, it may be seen that the use of the European Code [17] implies safety margins of 1.5 for the compression step (Fig. 12-a) and

Fig. 10. Result comparison for the vertical stiffness plotted against vertical (a) and shear (b) displacements.

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Fig. 12. Maximum stress in fibre layers for compression (a) and shear (b) step.

Fig. 13. Maximum rubber tangential stress.

1.6 for the shear step (Fig. 12-b). Therefore, Eq. (6) is valid for
calculating the allowable vertical load for a design as it includes a safety margin. A further interesting quantity is the tangential stress in the rubber. For steel plate-strengthened elements, the following formulation can be used [2]:
Fv = AGS ,

(8)

where Fv is the vertical load, A is the bearing horizontal area, S is the shape factor and is the shear strain. Taking into account that = G , it can be written:

the two models is made to find out if the 2D model provides as good results as the 3D model. Both 2D and 3D models are set up with a mass constrained to the upper surface and a 20 s acceleration time history (Fig. 14-a) applied to the bottom surface (ground). The analyses are performed in two steps. In the first, the gravity load is statically applied to the mass, whereas in the second, the horizontal acceleration time history is applied on the bottom of the bearing. For the liquid storage tank studied in the next section, a total number of 140 bearings are necessary due to the vertical load and the horizontal excitation. As a first approximation, an infinitely rigid base is assumed for the tank and therefore, each bearing is loaded by a horizontal action due to a mass calculated as the total mass divided by 140. The required horizontal stiffness of 700 N/mm results from the prescribed period of the whole structure. A Rayleigh damping is applied with a target value of 0.15 for the fraction of the critical damping factor. In the first analysis step, in which the bearing gets under compression by gravity, the 2D model provides results largely different from the 3D model. This because the 2D model includes plane strain elements with constrained out-of-plane deformation and this leads to a strong vertical displacement reduction and a fictitious vertical stiffness increment (up to 62%). In the second analysis step, on the contrary, the 2D model provides results almost identical to the 3D model because in this step, the lateral deformation has a low influence. Therefore, it can be concluded that the 3D model is necessary to study the vertical stiffness, while the 2D model is enough to evaluate the behaviours implying shear displacements. 6. The isolation of a liquid storage tank by means of fibre reinforced rubber bearings The consequences of earthquake damages on petrochemical facilities can strongly impact the surrounding areas and population, due to the toxic products released to the environment and the direct and indirect economic losses. In particular, tanks are amongst the most critical installations and therefore, the seismic isolation of these structures is of high importance in order to mitigate the consequences of earthquake damage to those plants. Some examples of the damage suffered by tanks in past earthquakes can be found in [1820]. In the second part of this work, a numerical study on a liquid storage tank subjected to static and dynamic actions is performed. The final aim is to design and verify a good solution for the seismic isolation of a tank. Additional information can be found in [21]. The study is divided into the following points:

rubber =

Fv AS

(9)

becoming the tangential stress independent of the shear modulus. The comparison between numerical and analytical tangential stress in the rubber matrix is plotted in Fig. 13. In this case, the simplified calculations provide results which are in high agreement with the numerical ones. 5. Dynamic behaviour of the fibre reinforced rubber bearings Since bearings are designed to isolate structures against earthquake excitations, the evaluation of the bearing behaviour by dynamic analyses is essential. Dynamic simulations are performed for the 490 490 150 bearing with 24 fabric layers, G = 0.45 MPa and the Neo Hooke material law. Two different FE models, namely a 2D and a 3D model, are employed. A 3D model implies a large number of elements and therefore, a non-linear, time history simulation with direct integration is extremely time-consuming since the non-linear problem has to be solved for a large number of increments. From this point of view, a 2D model is preferred as it is simpler to handle and faster in calculation. A comparison between

Evaluation and design. A design solution is proposed and

analyzed in order to improve the load-carrying system and the bearing configuration at the bottom of the tank.

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Fig. 14. Acceleration time history (a) and related acceleration spectrum (b). Table 4 Main properties of the investigated tank Stored product Diameter (m) Height (m) Volume (m3 ) Ratio height / diameter Roof type Design code Year of construction Roof thickness Lateral shell thickness Bottom plate thickness Water 24.4 18.3 8560 0.75 (mean) fixed API 650 1986 8 mm 187 mm variable 10 mm

Analysis A. FE analysis of an unisolated tank with bearings

modelled as rigid connectors (A1) and of an isolated tank with bearings replaced by non-linear connectors (A2). Comparing the two cases, it is possible to understand the effect of the isolation system. Analysis B. FE analysis of the tank with bearings replaced by non-linear connectors but, for the two most loaded locations, the FE model of the bearing presented in the first part of the work is inserted in the full-scale analysis. The main properties of the investigated tank are summarized in Table 4. Following the approach reported in [22], the total mass of the water is divided into two parts, the impulsive mass Mi , rigidly fixed to the tank at the height Hi :
Mi =

where R is the tank radius, H is the liquid height at rest, M is the total liquid mass and g is the acceleration due to gravity. For cylindrical tanks, the coefficients and are 1.33 and 2.0 respectively, if the hydrodynamic moment on the tank bottom is to be included in the computations, or 0 and 1.0 respectively, if only the effects of hydrodynamic pressures on the container walls are of interest. Based on this formulation, the calculated values are M = 8556 982 kg, Mi = 6132 011 kg, Ms = 2229 935 kg, Hi = 10.61 m, Hs = 13.56 m, Ks = 3329 N/mm. It has to be noted that, following this procedure, verification of the structure with respect to the sloshing waves during the earthquake events is not possible. The sloshing wave verification can be performed by employing a simplified method [23]. 6.1. Evaluation and design A tank without an isolation system has the bottom plate based on the ground. Since the structure has to be supported locally by bearings, the bottom load-carrying system needs to be redesigned in order to limit the deflection and to optimize the vertical load distribution. Fig. 15 shows the design of the bottom supporting system. This configuration requires a 30 mm-thick bottom plate. The tuning is based on the allowable steel yield strength and the maximum 490 490 150 bearing load capacity. In the same figure, some relevant points indicated by C (Connectors) and B (Bearings) are reported. The C points represent the selected locations where the analysis results are evaluated and compared. The B points indicate where the full FE models of the bearings are inserted in the analysis B. 6.2. Analysis A The aim of the analysis A is to evaluate the dynamic behaviour of the whole structure. The FE analysis of the tank is carried out

tanh 1.7R/H 1.7R/H

M, M Mi

(10)

Hi = 0.38H 1 +

(11)

and the sloshing mass Ms , connected to the tank at the height Hs with springs of stiffness Ks :
Ms =

0.71 tanh 1.8H/R 1.8H/R

M Ms

M, R H RM HMs
2 2

(12)

Hs = H 1 0.21

+ 0.55
2 4.75gMs H

R H

0.15

1,

(13)

Ks =

MR2

(14)

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Fig. 15. Configuration of the bottom load carrying system.

Fig. 16. FE model with monitoring points for analysis A (a) and analysis B (b).

with the commercial code ABAQUS [12]. Using the symmetry of the structure only half the tank is modelled. An optimization procedure based on accuracy of results was carried out in some preliminary analyses in order to find the best of five different meshes. To model the bottom plate and the shell, the 8-node, reduced integration, using five degrees of freedom per node, doubly curved thin shell element S8R5 is used. To model the stiffening beams, the 3-node, quadratic beam in space B32 is used, whereas to model the sloshing effect, the 2-node linear 3D truss element T3D2 is chosen. The mesh with the locations of the monitoring points (MP) where displacements and accelerations are recorded, is shown in Fig. 16a. The MP1 is linked to the ground, the MP2 is situated on the bottom plate, the MP3 at the half height of the shell and the MP4 at the top of the shell. The numerical analyses are divided in two steps: in the first, the gravity and the hydrostatic loads are statically applied, whereas in the second, a 20 s acceleration time history (Fig. 14-a) is applied to the ground under the tank. In this dynamic step, the time interval is 0.01 s. In this analysis, the bearings are replaced by connector elements which act in each horizontal direction as a non-linear spring combined in parallel with a linear damper [1] (Fig. 17). In the vertical direction, only the non-linear spring is inserted. The nonlinear law for elastic behaviour is taken from the previous study of the bearing, (Eq. (3), Fig. 6). A comparative study between several different modelling techniques for bearing elements is performed in [24]. As a

Fig. 17. Simplified bearing model.

conclusion, the adopted simplified model can be properly used in order to obtain a reliable description of the bearing. The damping effect provided by the bearing is modelled as a linear damper with the coefficient calculated as
c=

4
T

m,

(15)

where T and m are the period and the total mass of the system respectively and is the fraction of the critical damping. The value of c has been calculated for a target value of = 0.15. Table 5 shows the results for both unisolated and isolated systems. The results show that there is no remarkable difference for the stress distribution in the static step while a big difference arises in the dynamic step. Fig. 18 shows the results for Von Mises stress and deflection in the bottom plate. The maximum Von Mises stress is recorded in the

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Fig. 18. Max Von Mises stress (a) and deflection (b) in the bottom plate under dynamic loads with isolators.

Fig. 19. Maximum Von Mises stresses in tank shell without isolators (a) and with isolators (b).

Table 5 Result comparison Stress\ location Max Von Mises stress in bottom plate (static step) Max Von Mises stress in bottom plate (dynamic step) Max deflection in bottom plate (static step) Max deflection in bottom plate (dynamic step) Max Von Mises stress in bottom beams (static step) Max Von Mises stress in bottom beams (dynamic step) Max Von Mises stress in tank shell (dynamic step) Unisolated 191 MPa 330 MPa 10 mm 11 mm 297 MPa 962 MPa 1152 MPa Isolated 191 MPa 249 MPa 10 mm 11 mm 297 MPa 310 MPa 339 MPa

regions where the plate is supported by the beams. It has to be considered, however, that in the FE model, the beams supporting the plate are considered as lines, neglecting the real beam width. Thus, due to this singularity effect, lower real stress can be expected. The Von Mises stress in the tank shell is shown for unisolated and isolated structures in Fig. 19. For the isolated case, the maximum value is 810 MPa which is located at the sloshing mass height. However, it has to be considered that this maximum stress depends on the number of trusses chosen to model the sloshing effect. A higher number of trusses provides a better load distribution and the stresses decrease. Therefore, excluding the singularities caused by the sloshing mass, the maximum value is 339 MPa (Fig. 19-b). In order to investigate the behaviour of the bearings under the tank structure, three representative connectors (C) located in the worst positions are chosen to visualize the output results (Fig. 15). Fig. 20 shows the vertical load on the connectors for both unisolated (a) and isolated (b) structures. In both cases, the internal bearings (C2 and C3) are more loaded in static conditions but they

have less dynamic oscillations. In contrast, the external one (C1) has less static load but very high dynamic oscillations. The fixed base leads to an overturning effect inducing very high vertical load oscillations on the connectors. In particular, the external bearing (A) has a maximum load of 3600 kN in compression and of 2600 kN in tension. In the isolated system, on the contrary, the overturning effect is highly reduced. The vertical oscillations lead to a maximum load of 1120 kN in compression and of 47 kN in tension, both compatible with the bearing properties. However, it has to be mentioned that uplifting is reached only at two peaks during the time history. Regarding uplifting, the analysis shows that all the connectors on the external circle are subjected to uplift because they have a lower static vertical load but the uplift displacements are negligible. Fig. 21 shows the horizontal displacements for the monitoring points for both unisolated and isolated cases. In the unisolated case the connectors are rigid and therefore, the differences between the lines are due to the tank deformation perpendicular to the shell only. This can be seen especially for MP3 which is located at the middle height of the tank. On the other hand, in the isolated

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Fig. 20. Vertical load on connectors without isolators (a) and with isolators (b).

Fig. 21. Absolute horizontal displacements for the MPs without isolators (a) and with isolators (b).

Fig. 22. Horizontal acceleration comparison (a) and relative displacement (b) for MP1 and MP2.

case, the low bearing horizontal stiffness leads to a displacement concentration at the bearing level while the superposed tank moves almost like a rigid body. In fact, the MPs located on the tank have nearly the same displacements while the ground (MP1) has a different movement. Obviously, the absolute displacements in the isolated case are, as expected, greater than in the unisolated. Fig. 22-a shows the effect of the isolation system on the horizontal acceleration of MP1 and MP2. The acceleration is strongly reduced (about 50%) by the isolation system with a maximum value of 2.055 m/s2 . In Fig. 22-b the relative displacement between MP1 and MP2 is illustrated. Therefore, the maximum shear displacement for the GFRB is about 110 mm. Due to the high in-plane stiffness of the bottom plate and supporting system, all the connectors have the same movements. The effect of the isolation system on the dynamic behaviour of the structure is investigated through a modal analysis, as well. Two mode shapes are isolated from the numerical analysis, eliminating all the local modes corresponding to the shell natural frequencies. For the structure without isolation, the mode shape exciting the

sloshing mass has a frequency fs = 0.18 Hz, while the mode exciting the impulsive mass corresponds to fi = 4.74 Hz. In order to obtain a validation of these values, the simplified procedure reported in [23] is used for comparison. In this case, the obtained values are fs = 0.19 Hz and fi = 4.55 Hz. For the structure with isolation, the sloshing mass has the same frequency fs = 0.18 Hz while the impulsive mass is excited by fi = 0.64 Hz. By comparing the isolated and unisolated frequencies, the effect of the isolating system on the structure can be clearly highlighted. 6.3. Analysis B The aim of the analysis B is to investigate the bearing behaviour in a full-scale simulation. The structural model is the same used in analysis A including small approximations to decrease the problem size. In fact, replacing two of the connector elements with two full FE models of the bearings would produce a huge calculation with unacceptable computational time. Therefore, the shell is divided in two parts. The first is the bottom plate, modelled as in analysis A.

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Fig. 23. Bearing deformed mesh for the maximum relative displacement.

Fig. 25. Simplified tank models: one (a) and two (b) DOF.

The second is the shell and the tank roof, modelled as rigid bodies. This approximation is introduced because the aim of this analysis is to study the bearing behaviour and not the shell behaviour which was already investigated in analysis A. The bottom plate and the stiffening system are modelled as deformable in order to obtain the real vertical load on each bearing. For the deformable part, the already used mesh is adopted whereas for the rigid part, a coarse mesh is used (Fig. 16-b). The bearing FE models are inserted in the two worst positions under the tank as reported in Fig. 15. The first bearing is subjected to the maximum vertical load oscillation during the dynamic step while the second has the maximum vertical load under static conditions. The interesting outcomes are the effects of the excitation on the bearings and in consequence on rubber and fibre layers. In fact, the results related to the tank (bottom plate and beams, monitoring points) present a unremarkable difference with respect to the analysis A. Fig. 23 shows the bearing for the maximum horizontal relative displacement of 112 mm. The in-plane principal stress distribution in the fibre layers of the bearing B2 in the dynamic step is shown in Fig. 24-a. The maximum stresses for static and dynamic loads are 170 and 210 MPa respectively, smaller than the allowable fabric stress of 250 MPa. The correspondent maximum values for the bearing B1 are 41 and 106 MPa for static and dynamic loads respectively. Fig. 24-b shows the tangential stresses in rubber for bearing B2 under dynamic loads. The maximum values are 0.22 and 0.64 MPa for static and dynamic loads respectively. The analysis provides for bearing B1 the values 0.06 and 0.51 MPa respectively. Evaluating these results it is possible to conclude that the rubber and the layers are subjected to a stress range that is compatible with their allowable strength values. Moreover, the differences in results between the two bearings were expected due to their different location under the bottom stiffening system.

6.4. Comparison with simplified models For the practical design of structures subjected to earthquakes, it seems to be efficient and reliable to use the application of simple models related to the specific design tasks instead of the development of extensive models [25]. Moreover, simplified models are always a fundamental step for the global verification of any FE calculation. Obviously, in general, only the behaviour of a limited part of the structure or the global behaviour can be evaluated by simple models: all the different aspects can be captured only by a full-scale comprehensive analysis. Simplified methods for the structural design and verification of liquid storage tanks are presented in [23,26,27] and some of them have already been used for the modal analysis verification. Now, additional analysis with two simplified models (one and two degrees of freedom (DOF), Fig. 25) is performed. The results are compared in order to evaluate whether or not the simple models can effectively capture the structural behaviour. In the one DOF system, the phenomenon of the sloshing mass is neglected and the total mass of the structure (water + shell) is concentrated in a single point connected to the ground by a linear spring with the bearing stiffness. In the two DOF system, the mass is divided into two parts. The first is the shell + water impulsive mass which is connected to the ground with the same spring as used before. The second is the water sloshing mass connected to the previous one by a linear spring with the sloshing stiffness. The bearing stiffness is calculated by a constant value of 700 N/mm for each bearing. In Table 6, the results obtained by the simplified models are compared with those obtained by the full-scale FE analysis taken as a reference. It must be noted that the one DOF system is not able to predict the real behaviour of the structure. Only the two DOF system can capture the real nature of the problem with an acceptable approximation.

Fig. 24. Stress in fibre layers (a) and tangential stress in rubber (b) under dynamic loads for bearing B2.

A. Mordini, A. Strauss / Engineering Structures 30 (2008) 27392751 Table 6 FE and simplified models result comparison Model Full-scale FE 1 DOF 2 DOF Max relative displacement (mm) 110 134 124 Ratio 1 1.25 1.13 Max acceleration (mm/s2 ) 2055 1377 1917

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Ratio 1 0.67 0.93

7. Conclusions This document describes the development of a new device for seismic isolation of structures. A Fibre Reinforced Rubber Bearing with interposed glass fibre layers was investigated in a wide parametric numerical program by means of Finite Element analyses. Several different bearings were investigated in both static and dynamic conditions in order to obtain the full description of their behaviour. Many analyses were performed with different vertical loads, number of layers, geometries, boundary conditions and material constitutive models. Moreover, a dynamic analysis with comparison between a two-dimensional and a threedimensional model was performed. Three different experimental campaigns provided useful information for modelling. When possible, the results obtained from the Finite Element simulations were compared with simplified calculations. In particular, by employing well established simplified formulations, the vertical and horizontal stiffness, as well as fibre and rubber stresses were investigated. The bearing stiffness behaviour was summarized in simple, smooth, 2nd order analytical laws by the fitting of numerical results. In fact, due to the excessive computational time, it is not possible to insert the FE model of the bearing into full-scale structural analyses. Therefore, the non-linear laws can be assigned to simple connector elements which can replace the bearings in large analyses. This modelling technique was finally applied to the dynamic analysis of a liquid storage tank. The aim of the study was to design and verify a good solution for seismic isolation of the structure using Glass Fibre Reinforced Bearings. At first, (evaluation and design), a new configuration for the bottom load carrying system was designed and verified. Then, (analysis A), the Finite Element analysis of the tank was performed in both isolated and unisolated configurations. In the isolated case, bearings were replaced with non-linear connector elements described by laws extracted from the previous study. Finally, (analysis B), the Finite Element analysis of the tank was performed inserting the full model of the two most loaded bearings. Moreover, the bearing materials (fibre layers and rubber) were verified and maximum stresses were reported. The tank analyses were also verified through the comparison of simple one and two degrees of freedom systems. In all the analyses expected acceleration reduction and period shift were recorded and the validity of the design choices was documented and verified by modal analysis as well as displacement and stress checking. Acknowledgments The support by the European Commission, Contract EVG1-CT2002-00065 for the project Development of INnovative DEvices for Seismic Protection of PeTrocHemical Facilities is gratefully acknowledged. The opinions and conclusions presented in this

paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsoring organizations. References
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