Design of a Tuned Liquid Damper System for Seismic Vibration Control of Elevated Water Tanks

In this paper, a Tuned Liquid Damper (TLD) system is proposed for the response mitigation of an elevated water tank structure under seismic excitation. First, a study on the performance of the TLD system attached to an elevated water tank structure modelled as a single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) system is carried out in the frequency domain. Fluid-structure interaction is not considered in the present study. A realistic example of an elevated water tank structure is considered. The performance of the TLD system is examined on the basis of reduction in the root mean square (rms) value of the structural displacement. The sensitivity of the performance of the TLD system to change in the structural frequency due to fluctuation in the amount of water in the water tank container is examined. A time domain study is also carried out with the recorded accelerogram of the El Centro earthquake as the base input. The procedure to obtain a practical configuration of the TLD units is outlined. The performance of the designed TLD system indicates that the TLD is a promising device for the seismic vibration control of elevated water tanks.