Analytical and experimental investigations on the performance of tuned liquid column ball damper considering a hollow ball

Passive vibration control devices like tuned liquid column dampers (TLCD) not only significantly reduce buildings' vibrations but also can serve as a water storage facility. The recently introduced modified form of TLCD known as tuned liquid column ball damper (TLCBD) suppressed external vibration efficiently compared to traditional TLCD. For excellent performance, the mass ratio of TLCBD should be in the range of 5% to 7%, which does not include the mass of the ball. This additional mass of the ball increases the overall structure mass. Therefore, in this paper, an effort is made to reduce the mass of TLCBD. For this purpose, a new modified version of TLCBD known as tuned liquid column hollow ball damper (TLCHBD) is proposed. The existing mathematical modeling of TLCBD is used for this new damper by updating the numerical values of the mass and mass moment of the ball. Analytically the optimal design parameters are obtained. Numerically the TLCHBD is investigated with a single degree of freedom structure under harmonic and seismic loadings. It is found that TLCHBD performance is similar to TLCBD in both loadings' cases. To validate the numerical results, an experimental study is conducted. The mass of the ball of TLCHBD is reduced by 50% compared to the ball of TLCBD. Both the arrangements are studied with a multi-degree of freedom structure under harmonic and seismic loadings using a shake table. The results of the experimental study confirm the numerical findings. It is found that the performance behavior of both the dampers is almost similar under harmonic and seismic loadings. In short, the TLCHBD is lighter in weight than TLCBD but has a similar vibration suppression ability.