Study on Seismic Performance of Coupled Shear Walls with Vertical Dampers

A new damping wall system is proposed to improve the seismic performance of high-rise coupling shear walls. The coupling beams of the proposed wall are slit in the middle with damping devices (steel dampers) installed in the slit vertically aiming to dissipate energy during earthquakes and prevent severe damage of the structure. A FEM program named OpenSees is used to analyze the seismic performance of the new damping wall utilizing macro finite element model. During the analysis, influence of damper parameters and other factors on seismic performance of the damping wall is considered, and the analysis indicates that with proper damper parameters, the new damping wall can be provided with better seismic performance compared with the conventional wall.