Influence of the deteriorated anti-seismic devices on seismic performance and device behavior of continuous girder bridges

Various seismic isolation and reduction devices have been applied to suppress the longitudinal vibration of continuous girder bridges. As representative devices, lead rubber bearing (LRB) and fluid viscous damper (FVD) might suffer from deterioration during the long-term service. This study aims to evaluate the impact of device deterioration on the seismic responses of continuous girder bridges and investigate the seismic behavior of deteriorated LRBs and FVDs. Seismic performance of a simplified bridge model was investigated, and the influence of device deterioration was evaluated by the coefficient of variation method. The contribution of LRB and FVD was assessed by the Sobol global sensitivity analysis method. Finally, the seismic behaviors of deteriorated LRBs and FVDs were discussed. The result shows that (i) the girder-pier relative displacement is the most sensitive to the changes in the deterioration level, (ii) the deterioration of FVD has a greater effect on the structural responses than that of LRB, (iii) FVD plays a major role in energy dissipation with a low degradation level while LRB is more essential in dissipating energy when suffering from high degradation level, (iv) the deteriorated devices are more likely to reach the ultimate state and thus be damaged.