Semi-active predictive control strategy for seismically excited structures using MRF-04K dampers

The theoretical study of a semi-active predictive control (SAPC) system with magnetorheological (MR) dampers to reduce the responses of seismically excited structures was presented. The SAPC scheme is based on a prediction model of the system response to obtain the control actions by minimizing an object function, which has a function of self-compensation for time delay occurring in real application. A double-ended shear mode combined with a valve mode MR damper, named MRF-04K damper, with the maximum force of 20 kN was designed and manufactured, and parameters of the Bouc-Wen hysteresis model were determined to portray the behavior of this damper. As an example, a 5-story building frame equipped with 2 MRF-04K dampers was presented to demonstrate the performance of the proposed SAPC scheme for addressing time delay and reducing the structural responses under different earthquakes. Comparison with the uncontrolled structure, the passive-off and passive-on cases indicates that both the peak and the norm values of structural responses are all clearly reduced, and the SAPC scheme has a better performance than the two passive cases.