AHA Moment!

1 Lesson Recap:
• Earthquakes are caused by the rebound of the plates due to elastic stress.
• Earthquakes happen at faults, of which there are 3: Normal dip-slip, Reverse
dip-slip, and Strike-slip.
• Earthquakes produce body waves in P and S types, and surface waves in L
and R types.
• The time between the P and S waves can be used to calculate the location of
the epicenter of an earthquake.
• The magnitude is a measure of the energy released by an earthquake, while
the intensity measures the devastation.

2 Amazing Things:
2.1 Tuned Mass Dampers
Figure 1: Taipei 101’s tuned
mass damper
With the rise of taller skyscrapers, earthquakes have
become a greater danger and engineers have to find
ways to mitigate their effects on people. One of ways
that this is done is via a tuned mass damper: a mass
that is attached to a building via a spring that damp-
ens or weakens the motion of the building. Dampers
like these have to be tuned: they do this by altering
the mass and the spring in just the right way so that
the building will return to a stable position as quickly
as possible.

3 How It Works:
3.1 Concepts
All items have a natural frequency: this is determined by the properties of an object,
like height, mass, and stiffness1 (minutephysics, 2018),
and is the cause of things such as goblets of wa-
ter ”singing”, and sopranos breaking wine glasses. In
the case of buildings, this effect can be deadly: if an
earthquake shakes a building at its natural frequency,
it will oscillate until it falls apart in an effect called ”res-
onance”.
Another interesting property that was discovered Figure 2: A 2-mass, 2-
is that 2 masses connected on springs to a brick wall spring, 1-brick wall system
oscillate in a weird way if you only oscillate the first.
The kinetic energy of the first mass transfers to the second mass completely then
1
transfers back to the first mass, completely as well in a way that preserves the
momentum of the entire system. The peak velocity of the system, if charted as
the y-axis with respect to time, resembles figure 3: we can see that it goes up, then
down, then up.

3.2 Effects of Friction

In real life, this swapping does not go on forever: it
stops because of friction and air resistance. How-
ever, engineers realized that there might be a way to
take advantage of friction: if the damper were con-
nected to something which converted kinetic energy
to something else, the second mass would just keep
on siphoning off energy from the first until both came Figure 3: The aforemen-
to a halt. This is the basis of a mass damper: the ”brick tioned graph
wall” is the Earth, the first mass is the building, the second mass is the damper, and
the siphoner is a shock absorber. It just so happens that the effect described above
is strongest when both ”systems” have the same resonant frequency: therefore, the
spring and the mass have to be a certain number. The process of correcting these
values is similar to tuning, and thus the entire system is called a tuned mass damper.

4 Applications
Tuned Mass Dampers are primarily used to ward off the effects of earthquakes
and wind in buildings, bridges, and the like. The most prominent one is the tuned
mass damper in Taipei 101, which is not hidden from the public but is actually in plain
view for all to see– it even has souveniers in the gift shop called ”Damper Babies”.
However, other buildings also have tuned mass dampers: The Burj Al-Arab in the
UAE also has tuned mass dampers on its exoskeleton (Gaspar, 2017), and the Statue
of Unity in India (Raja and Mohanty, 2018). Floating power lines like the ones seen in
SLEX also have tuned mass dampers: these are called Stockbridge Dampers, and
are used to mitigate the effects of the wind. All in all, tuned mass dampers are a
way to mitigate the effect of sidewards motion to ensure that we continue to move
forward. Thank you!

(a) A damper baby in front of their damper

parent (b) A stockbridge damper
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References
Collins, D. (2020, January 21). What is a tuned mass damper and how is it
used in motion control? Motion Control Tips. Retrieved from https://www.
motioncontroltips.com/what-is-a-tuned-mass-damper-and-how-is-it-used-
in-motion-control/
Gaspar, M. (2017, November 22). The mechanism and applications of a tuned
mass damper (tmd). BSBG. Retrieved from https://bsbgroup.com/blog/the-
mechanism-and-applications-of-tuned-mass-damper-tmd
Hamakareem, M. (n.d.). Tuned mass damper – components, working and appli-
cations. Retrieved from https://theconstructor.org/structural- engg/tuned-
mass-damper/1198/
Lai, J., Barbieri, N., & Barbieri, R. (2012). Dynamic analysis of stockbridge damper.
Advances in Acoustics and Vibration, 2012. doi:https://doi.org/10.1155/2012/
659398
minutephysics. (2018, August 28). How to stop structures from shaking: Lego sat-
urn v tuned mass damper. Youtube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=ft3vTaYbkdE
Natural frequency. (n.d.). Retrieved December 11, 2020. The Physics Classroom. Re-
trieved from https : / / www . physicsclassroom . com / class / sound / Lesson -
4/Natural-Frequency
Raja, A., & Mohanty, A. (2018, September 24). Iron man 2.0. Retrieved from https:
/ / indianexpress . com / article / india / sardar - vallabhbhai - patel - statue - of -
unity-worlds-tallest-statue-iron-man-5370011/
Wikipedia Contributors. (2020a, November 11). Damping ratio. In Wikipedia. Re-
trieved December 11, 2020. Wikipedia. Retrieved from https : / / en . wikipedia .
org/wiki/Damping_ratio?oldformat=true
Wikipedia Contributors. (2020b, December 10). Harmonic oscillator. In Wikipedia.
Retrieved December 11, 2020. Wikipedia. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Harmonic_oscillator?oldformat=true
Wikipedia Contributors. (2020c, June 29). Natural frequency. In Wikipedia. Re-
trieved December 11, 2020. Wikipedia. Retrieved from https : / / en . wikipedia .
org/wiki/Natural_frequency?oldformat=true
Wikipedia Contributors. (2020d, October 27). Stockbridge damper. In Wikipedia.
Retrieved December 11, 2020. Wikipedia. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Stockbridge_damper?oldformat=true
Wikipedia Contributors. (2020e, December 9). Tuned mass dampers. In Wikipedia.
Retreived December 11, 2020. Wikipedia. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Tuned_mass_damper?oldformat=true

1 Formally, the eigenfrequency in a simple mass-spring

√ system is defined as the square root of the
spring’s stiffness k and the mass of the load or m: ω = k
m
This does not take into account dampening
from friction. Thank you!
3