Reduction of seismic pounding effects of base-isolated RC highway bridges using MR damper

Significant structural damages due to pounding between adjacent superstructures of multispan reinforced concrete (RC) highway bridges have been observed in past earthquakes. Different methods have been proposed in the literature to mitigate the adverse seismic pounding effects. This paper presents an analytical investigation on the use of magnetorheological (MR) dampers in reducing seismic pounding effects of base-isolated multi-span RC highway bridges. It has been observed that MR damper can effectively reduce the seismic pounding effect. Three control strategies (passive off, passive on, and bang bang control) of MR damper have been investigated. Although all the control strategies are found to be effective, bang bang control has been observed to be the most effective.