Lu 2016

EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING & STRUCTURAL DYNAMICS
Earthquake Engng Struct. Dyn. 2016

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com). DOI: 10.1002/eqe.2826
Experimental and analytical study on the performance of particle

tuned mass dampers under seismic excitation
Zheng Lu1,2, Xiaoyi Chen2, Dingchang Zhang2 and Kaoshan Dai1,2,*,†

1
State Key Laboratory of Disaster Reduction in Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
2
Research Institute of Structural Engineering and Disaster Reduction, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
SUMMARY
A particle tuned mass damper (PTMD), which is a creative integration of a traditional tuned mass damper
and an efficient particle damper in the vibration control area, is proposed. This paper presents a comprehen-
sive study that involves experimental, analytical, and computational approaches. The vibration control
effects of a PTMD that is attached to a five-story steel frame under seismic input are investigated by a series
of shaking table tests. The influence of some parameters (auxiliary mass ratio, gap clearance, mass ratio of
particles to the total auxiliary mass, frequency characteristics, and amplitude level of the input) is explored,
and the performance of the PTMD with/without buffered material is compared. The experimental results
show that the PTMD can achieve significant damping effects under seismic excitations, and the bandwidth
of the suppression frequency is expanded, showing the device’s robustness and control efficiency. In
addition, an approximately analytical solution that is based on the concept of an equivalent single-particle
damper is presented, and the method to determine the corresponding system parameters is introduced. A
comparative study between experimental and numerical results is conducted to verify the feasibility and
accuracy of this analytical model. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Received 24 May 2016; Revised 17 August 2016; Accepted 9 September 2016
KEY WORDS: particle tuned mass damper; tuned mass damper; particle damper; shaking table test;
numerical simulation; passive vibration control
1. INTRODUCTION
Structural control plays a very important role in engineering. Since Yao [1] introduced the concept of
vibration control to civil engineering area in 1972, the theory and design methods have developed
significantly. Scholars and engineers have proposed various strategies to attenuate vibrations to
reduce injuries or casualties and economic losses that are caused by earthquakes and to guarantee
the comfortable feelings of occupants under wind excitations [2–6]. However, traditional controlling
devices cannot meet practical requirements given the complicated environmental situations in
different regions and specific requirements of projects. Therefore, developing new types of devices
that are more convenient and can efficiently control structural vibrations is essential.
Over the past several decades, passive strategies have been widely applied in the civil engineering
field because of their simplicity and free extra energy input, which mainly include tuned mass
dampers (TMDs), viscoelastic dampers, mild steel dampers, and friction dampers. TMDs are a
traditional passive control device with wide applications, such as in Shanghai Center Tower [7],
Taipei 101 [8], Milad Tower [9], and Chiba Port Tower. Additionally, the optimal design of TMDs
is relatively mature [10, 11]. Research has shown that TMDs, if properly tuned, can effectively
*Correspondence to: Kaoshan Dai, State Key Laboratory of Disaster Reduction in Civil Engineering, Tongji University,
Shanghai 200092, China.
†
E-mail: kdai@tongji.edu.cn
Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Z. LU ET AL.
suppress excessive vibrations in high-rise buildings [12], high-rise towers, and pedestrian bridges, es-
pecially for wind-induced vibrations.
However, research has also shown that the vibration control effects of TMDs under seismic
excitations are less satisfactory. In addition, TMDs have many inherent limitations: these devices
can achieve favorable control effects only under specifically tuned frequencies, and their damping
element is a viscous damper, which has poor durability and gradually deteriorates over time.
Therefore, scholars [13, 14] have introduced nonlinear stiffness and nonlinear damping, such as
impact damping [15] or particle damping [16], into TMDs to expand their suppression frequency
bands and improve their damping performance.
Particle dampers, which consist of a space-limited container and freely moving particles, can
effectively dissipate vibration energy through collisions among particles and collisions between
particles and the container wall, friction, and sound radiation [17]. Particle dampers possess many
advantages in practical situations, including slight changes to the primary structure, wide reduction
frequency bands [18], high ruggedness and reliability, and insensitivity to extreme temperatures.
One typical application is a tall building with a particle damper system in Santiago, Chile. This system
performed very well during the 2010 offshore Maule, Chile earthquake [19]. Particle dampers have
been widely researched and applied in the areas of aviation and machinery engineering. However, re-
search of particle dampers in civil engineering is still in the early stages.
Some experimental studies and numerical simulations have been conducted to the characterized
particle dampers, and the results showed that the damping performance of particle dampers is
robust. Lu et al. [20, 21] conducted a series of shaking table tests for a three-story steel frame with a
particle damper or buffered particle damper attached and found that the particle movements of the
plug flow pattern can yield good vibration attenuation effects. Papalou et al. [22] proposed the use
of particle dampers in the form of classical drums and investigated the influence of some parameters
(mass ratio, placement of the damper, particle, and damper size) on the effectiveness of the particle
damper.
Scholars have proposed some simplified analytical methods to aid numerical simulations. Precise
dynamics analyses of a particle tuned mass damper (PTMD) systems are quite complex because of
the high nonlinearity of particles during collisions. For example, Papalou and Masri [23] verified the
test results of a particle damper by equating a multi-unit particle damper to a single-unit impact
damper based on certain equivalent principles. Friend and Kinra [24] also equated multiple particles
as a single mass and wrapped all the mechanisms of energy dissipation into an ‘effective coefficient
of restitution’. In addition, Lu et al. [25] evaluated the influence of some system parameters, such as
the particle materials, mass ratio, and excitation frequency, on the vibration control effects of
particle dampers based on the discrete element method. Yao and Chen [26] simulated particle
damping in microgravity or zero-gravity environments based on the discrete element method.
Researchers have introduced particle damping technology into TMDs and proposed a new device
called a PTMD to overcome the shortcomings of TMDs and provide an avenue for the application
of particle dampers in civil engineering. PTMDs combine features from conventional TMDs and
particle dampers by capitalizing on the strengths of different damping approaches. Yan et al. [27]
performed a series of shaking table tests for a 1/10-scale model bridge with/without tuned particle
dampers to evaluate the system’s performance and presented a finite element method for numerical
simulations based on the energy principle. Lu et al. [28] conducted an aero-elastic wind tunnel
experiment by attaching a PTMD onto a 1/200-scale benchmark model. Li et al. [29, 30] proposed a
pounding TMD and applied the device to the vibration control of a power transmission tower and
subsea jumpers.
In this paper, a PTMD is proposed by suspending a container that is filled with particles on top of an
earthquake-excited five-story steel frame. The damping performance of a controlled structure (with the
PTMD) and an uncontrolled structure is compared through a series of shaking table tests, and the
influence of some parameters on the vibration control effects of the PTMD is investigated. An
approximate analytical solution that is based on the concept of an equivalent single-particle damper
is presented, and a comparative study is performed to verify the reasonability and accuracy of the
proposed approximate solution. Furthermore, some suggestions for optimal PTMD designs are
presented.
Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Earthquake Engng Struct. Dyn. (2016)
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
EXPERIMENTAL AND ANALYTICAL STUDY ON PTMD UNDER SEISMIC EXCITATION
2. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP AND PROCEDURE
The experimental model consists of a five-story steel frame as the primary structure and a PTMD. The
test model is designed according to similitude laws, and Figure 1 shows the configuration of the model.
The total mass of the primary structure is 6000 kg, and the total height is 5.48 m. The frame columns
consist of high-strength steel plates (Q690) with width × length × height dimensions of
15 × 180 × 1060 mm. The slabs consist of steel plates (Q345) with plane dimensions of 2 × 2 m and a
thickness of 30 mm. The first natural frequency of the primary structure is adjusted as 1 Hz, which is
the common frequency of high-rise buildings. The second and third frequencies are 3 and 5 Hz,
respectively, and the damping ratio is 0.0025.
The PTMD is suspended on the top of the primary structure by four steel strands with the same
length, as shown in Figure 1(b). This device is attached symmetrically with respect to the shaking
direction and covered by a piece of protecting mesh. Considering its dynamic behavior and for
convenience, the PTMD is considered a single pendulum (similar to the design of a traditional
TMD), and its cable lengths are determined from Eq. (1):
L ¼ gðT=2π Þ2 (1)
where T is the natural period of vibration of the primary structure to be tuned (usually the first natural
period).
The container consists of wooden plates with a thickness of 4 cm, and the outer dimensions are
1000 × 640 × 300 mm. The container has two layers that are separated by a transverse wooden plate and
two vertical wooden plates into six small containers with inner dimensions of 288 × 283 × 120 mm, thus
forming a multi-unit damper. The total mass of the container is 39.345 kg. Learning from the
experience of Lu et al. [20], 180 steel balls with 51 mm diameter are uniformly placed into each
container, as shown in Figure 1(c). The total auxiliary mass ratio of the damper to the primary system
is 2.26%, which corresponds to the practical requirements and considers the optimal design.
Four ground motions (El Centro wave (1940, NS), Wenchuan wave (1995, NS), Japan 311 wave
(2011, NS), and Shanghai artificial wave (SHW2, 1996)) are utilized in the shaking table tests to inves-
tigate the vibration control effects of the PTMD under different seismic actions. Each type of seismic
wave acts along only one direction, and the peak value of the acceleration increases gradually from
0.05 to 0.2 g (g is the acceleration due to gravity). As shown in Figure 1(a), two displacement meters
(D1–D10) are installed near two columns in each layer to measure the X-direction displacement of the
model; two accelerometers (A1–A10) are installed near the other two columns to measure the X-
direction acceleration of the model. In addition, two displacement meters (D11 and D12) and two ac-
celerometers (A11 and A12) are set up on the container to measure the displacement and acceleration
of the PTMD along the X-direction, as shown in Figure 1(b).
Figure 1. Configuration of the test specimen: (a) primary structure, (b) photo of the experimental model, and
(c) photo of the particle tuned mass damper.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Z. LU ET AL.
Moreover, to explore the vibration reduction principles of the PTMD, some parameters of the
PTMD, including the auxiliary mass ratio, gap clearance, and mass ratio of particles to the total
auxiliary mass, are changed. In addition, the buffered material is stuck on the inner walls of the
container to examine its improvement for the reduction effects.
3. SYSTEM RESPONSE
The peak value and the root-mean-square (r.m.s.) value of the displacement and acceleration responses
are chosen to evaluate the damping performance of the PTMD. These values are both important
controlling indices in structural vibration control. The peak value reflects the dynamic response at a
certain instant, whereas the r.m.s. value indicates the vibration energy and reflects the responses
over an entire period. The vibration reduction effect is defined as follows: vibration reduction
effect = (response of uncontrolled structure response of controlled structure)/(response of
uncontrolled structure) × 100%.
3.1. Peak and root-mean-square responses

Tables I and II list the displacement and acceleration responses at the roof of the test frame under
different seismic wave intensities, respectively, including the peak value and the r.m.s. value. For
safety reasons, experiments with the uncontrolled structure under the SHW2 wave (0.1 g), El Centro
(0.2 g), Wenchuan (0.2 g), and SHW2 waves (0.2 g) were not conducted. When observing the results
under the SHW2 wave (0.05 g) and those under the other three waves (0.1 g), the primary structure
vibrated violently, so we extrapolated that these waves may cause the test frame to collapse.
However, the experiments with the controlled structure were conducted under these high-level
seismic inputs by estimating the reduction effects of the PTMD.
The responses of the test frame with the PTMD attached were smaller than most of the responses of
the uncontrolled structure, which demonstrates stable and efficient attenuation effects from the PTMD.
In addition, the vibration control effects for the r.m.s. response were generally more obvious than those
for the peak response, which indicates that the PTMD efficiently attenuated the entire response of the
primary structure over a period of time. Additionally, the vibration control effects for the acceleration
response generally were not as good as those for the displacement response because collisions could
cause abrupt changes in acceleration.
The reduction effects were favorable, especially under the SHW2 and El Centro waves. The best
vibration control effects for the peak and r.m.s. values of the displacement responses were 39.01%
and 72.17% (marked in bold), respectively; the values for the acceleration responses were 33.56%
and 70.99%, respectively. The differences in the vibration control effects among these seismic
inputs may have been caused by their levels and characteristics, which significantly influenced the
reduction effects (see detailed discussion in Section 4.4).
Table I. Displacement responses at the roof of the test frame (mm).

El Centro Wenchuan Japan 311 SHW2
Seismic input Peak r.m.s. Peak r.m.s. Peak r.m.s. Peak r.m.s.
0.05 g Uncontrolled 44.04 13.42 10.16 2.00 7.00 1.40 91.73 41.97
Controlled 39.29 5.07 9.67 1.78 5.83 0.90 55.94 11.68
Reduction effects (%) 10.79 62.22 4.82 11.00 16.71 35.71 39.01 72.17
0.1 g Uncontrolled 102.13 30.49 26.00 6.56 13.81 4.19 — —
Controlled 79.00 11.16 20.07 4.12 13.51 2.48 112.04 19.08
Reduction effects (%) 22.65 63.40 22.82 37.20 2.20 40.81 — —
0.2 g Uncontrolled — — — — 31.92 12.47 — —
Controlled 148.16 19.94 35.00 7.36 25.60 4.57 147.60 26.30
Reduction effects (%) — — — — 18.56 63.35 — —
r.m.s., root mean square.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Table II. Acceleration responses at the roof of the test frame (g).
0.05 g Uncontrolled 0.2447 0.0577 0.2140 0.0555 0.1146 0.0285 0.4142 0.1741
Controlled 0.2253 0.0253 0.2015 0.0471 0.1034 0.0250 0.2752 0.0505
Reduction effects (%) 7.93 56.15 5.84 15.14 9.77 12.28 33.56 70.99
0.1 g Uncontrolled 0.5542 0.1302 0.4540 0.1240 0.2782 0.0720 — —
Controlled 0.4796 0.0600 0.4457 0.1148 0.2662 0.0665 0.6312 0.0775
0.2 g Uncontrolled — — — — 0.5722 0.1442 — —
Controlled 0.9935 0.1367 0.8340 0.1937 0.5446 0.1324 1.5493 0.1593
Reduction effects (%) — — — — 4.78 8.11 — —
3.2. Time history responses

The time histories of the displacement and acceleration responses at the roof of the test frame under the
El Centro (0.1 g) and SHW2 waves (0.05 g) are shown in Figure 2. The PTMD significantly reduced
the peak values of the responses and quickly attenuated the responses over the entire period. This
phenomenon also indicates that the PTMD effectively reduced the r.m.s. responses.
Moreover, the reduction effects were not obvious at the beginning of the vibration. Specifically, the
time histories of the controlled structure and the uncontrolled structure under the El Centro wave
coincided with each other during the first 3 s, while the time histories under the SHW2 wave
coincided with each other during the first 5 s. These results occurred because sufficient collisions
Figure 2. Response time histories at the roof of the test frame: (a) displacement, El Centro (0.1 g); (b) accel-
eration, El Centro (0.1 g); (c) displacement, SHW2 (0.05 g); (d) acceleration, SHW2 (0.05 g).
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Z. LU ET AL.
among particles and collisions between particles and the container take some time. As time progresses,
the PTMD can fully exert its effects, so the responses of the controlled structure were quickly
attenuated, which is similar to the phenomenon of TMDs.
3.3. Peak responses at every floor

Figures 3 and 4 show the maximum displacement and maximum acceleration at every floor of the test
frame under different seismic inputs, respectively. Different vibration reduction effects occurred under
different seismic inputs. Specifically, the responses at every floor were effectively reduced under the El
Centro and SHW2 waves, whereas the PTMD exhibited little improvement in terms of vibration
control and the responses at some floors even increased under the Wenchuan and Japan 311 waves.
These results indicate that the vibration control effects of the PTMD had a complicated relationship
with the characteristics of the seismic inputs, which will be further discussed in Section 4.4.
Moreover, the vibration control effects under these seismic waves generally improved as the floor
increased, and the vibration control effects of the top floor were the best. These results mainly
occurred because the response at the top floor was the largest and because the PTMD was installed
on the top floor; consequently, the response at the top floor could be suppressed to a large degree.
Interestingly, the maximum acceleration of the first floor could be larger than that of the upper
floors, especially under the Wenchuan and Japan 311 waves. On the one hand, the building could be
Figure 3. Maximum displacements at every floor of the test frame under the (a) El Centro (0.1 g), (b)
Wenchuan (0.1 g), (c) Japan 311 (0.1 g), and (d) SHW2 waves (0.05 g).
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Figure 4. Maximum accelerations at every floor of the test frame under the (a) El Centro (0.1 g), (b)
Wenchuan (0.1 g), (c) Japan 311 (0.1 g), and (d) SHW2 waves (0.05 g).
regarded as a filter, and the high-frequency components of the excitation were gradually reduced as the
earthquake waves were transmitted from the ground to the upper parts of the structure. Finally, the fun-
damental frequency dominated the vibration of the structure. However, the high-frequency components
of the excitation still acted on the lower floors of the structure. On the other hand, the acceleration is
directly proportional to the square of the frequency. Therefore, the acceleration responses on the lower
floors, especially the first floor, were larger than those on the upper floors, although the displacements
were small.
3.4. Frequency domain responses

Figure 5(a)–(c) shows the power spectral density curves of the displacement responses at the fifth, the
third, and the first floors of the test frame, respectively. The reduction effects were greater for higher
floors than for lower floors. Moreover, the PTMD significantly attenuated the first mode of vibration
because of its installation position, whereas the reduction effects for higher modes were unstable,
which coincides with the phenomenon that was observed by Li [31]. The PTMD was suspended on
top of the primary structure, which experienced the maximum responses of the first mode, so the
responses could be effectively reduced. However, the maximum responses of the higher vibration
modes were not directly controlled by the PTMD, so the reduction effects were less satisfactory.
Given that the first vibration mode contributed the most to the system’s response, the ideal
installation positions for dampers in practice are the top stories, which experience the maximum
responses of the first mode.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Z. LU ET AL.
Figure 5. Power spectral density curves of the displacement responses at (a) the fifth, (b) the third, and (c) the
first floors.
4. PARAMETRIC STUDY
The influence of some system parameters, including the auxiliary mass ratio, gap clearance, mass ratio
of particles to the total auxiliary mass, frequency characteristic and amplitude level of input, and
buffered material, on the vibration control effects of the PTMD was experimentally investigated to
understand the physical working mechanisms of the PTMD and optimize its damping performance.
4.1. Effects of the auxiliary mass ratio

The auxiliary mass ratio is a very important parameter to the vibration control effects of TMDs because
this factor indirectly influences the optimal frequency and the optimal damping of TMDs. Similarly,
the auxiliary mass ratio significantly affects the energy dissipation of particle dampers. Therefore,
the influence of the auxiliary mass ratio on the damping performance of PTMDs was examined by
adding particles and keeping the containers the same, thus adjusting the auxiliary mass ratio to
0.66%, 1.19%, 1.73%, 2.26%, and 2.8%. To maintain the same gap clearance, the number of
particles in each container remained 20, and the number of containers with particles was changed.
The containers that included particles were symmetrically positioned. The reduction effects of the
maximum responses and r.m.s. responses at the roof of the test frame under the El Centro wave
(0.1 g) when using different damper masses are shown in Figure 6(a) and (b), respectively.
When the auxiliary mass ratio ranged from 0% to 2.8%, larger auxiliary mass ratios could achieve
better reduction effects in terms of the maximum responses. The collision of particles constitutes a
Figure 6. Effects of the auxiliary mass ratio on vibration reduction: (a) maximum response and (b) root-
mean-square (r.m.s.) response.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
large portion of the energy dissipation that is achieved by PTMDs, so increasing the mass of particles
can increase the energy dissipation for a certain range of auxiliary mass ratios. When the auxiliary mass
ratio ranged from 0.66% to 2.8%, the reduction effects improved slightly in terms of the r.m.s.
responses as the auxiliary mass ratio increased.
Moreover, the video records of the experiments showed that a damper with a slight auxiliary mass
ratio of 0.66% behaved as a conical pendulum even under one-way seismic input because the motion of
particles had high nonlinearity under excitation and could move along any direction, which results in
multidirectional collisions and more energy dissipation. Therefore, the container of the PTMD can be
optimized as a cylinder rather than a cuboid in practice, which allows particles to move freely in any
direction and thus dissipate more energy.
4.2. Effects of gap clearance

The gap clearance of the particles to the wall of the container is a very important parameter that
influences the vibration control effects of particle dampers. In the experiment, the influence of the
gap clearance on the vibration reduction was examined by setting this factor as 0 D, 1.64 D, 2.64 D,
3.64 D, and 5.64 D (D is the diameter of the particle) while keeping the auxiliary mass ratio as 1.73%.
Figure 7(a) shows the reduction effects of the r.m.s. acceleration responses at the roof of the test
frame under different gap clearances. The reduction effects of the r.m.s. response first increased and
then decreased gradually as the gap clearance increased. If the gap clearance was too small, the
particles were very likely to move together with the container, which led to few collisions.
However, if the gap clearance was too large, a long time was required for the particles to move from
one end of the container to the other, and only limited collisions occurred, which affected the
suppression efficiency. Therefore, the gap clearance should be kept as the optimal value to achieve
more efficient collisions among particles and between particles and the container.
In addition, the r.m.s. acceleration responses of the PTMD are plotted in Figure 7(b). As the gap
clearance increased, the r.m.s. responses of the PTMD first decreased and then increased. Moreover,
by comparing Figure 7(b) with (a), it is shown that the reduction effects of the primary structure
were more favorable when the responses of the PTMD were relatively small. Additionally, the best
damping performance can be achieved with a proper gap clearance, in which the damper
experiences stable and efficient movement. For example, the reduction effects were satisfactory, and
the responses of the PTMD were relatively mild when the gap clearance ranged from 1.64 D to 3.64 D.
For 0 D and 5.64 D (approximately equal to the length of the container) case, the PTMD could be
considered a TMD by increasing the mass of the container and eliminating the particles to keep the
Figure 7. Effects of gap clearance on the vibration reduction: (a) reduction effects of the root-mean-square (r.
m.s.) acceleration at the roof of the test frame and (b) r.m.s. acceleration of the particle tuned mass damper
(PTMD).
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Z. LU ET AL.
total auxiliary mass ratio the same. Additionally, the PTMD could dissipate extra energy through
collisions between particles compared with traditional TMDs.
4.3. Effects of the mass ratio of particles to the total auxiliary mass
Increasing the auxiliary mass ratio can improve the vibration control effects in a certain range.
Furthermore, the influence of higher particle mass on the vibration control effects when the total
auxiliary mass ratio is kept constant is an intriguing topic. On the one hand, the collisions among
particles and the collisions between particles and the container constitute a large portion of the
energy dissipation, so increasing the particle mass can increase the energy dissipation. On the other
hand, the damping ratio of the PTMD can be indirectly influenced by changing the particle mass.
In the experiment, the mass ratio of the particles to the total auxiliary mass was adjusted to be 0, 0.2,
0.38, 0.64, and 0.76, while the total auxiliary mass ratio was maintained as 1.73%. Figure 8 shows the
reduction effects of the peak acceleration and r.m.s. acceleration responses at the roof of the test frame
under different particle masses. The response reduction effects improved as the mass ratio of particles
to the auxiliary mass ratio increased. In terms of an optimal auxiliary mass ratio, increasing the
proportion of the particle mass can improve the vibration control effects to a certain extent.
4.4. Effects of the frequency characteristics and amplitude level of the input
The frequency characteristics and amplitude level of the seismic input play very important roles in the
vibration control of PTMDs. Therefore, the reduction effects of PTMDs when applying different types
of input with the same amplitude and the effects under a certain input with increasing amplitudes are
investigated.
As listed in Tables I and II, the reduction effects of the displacement and acceleration responses of
the PTMD were different under four types of excitations, and the effects for both the maximum and r.
m.s. responses were the best under the SHW2 wave. This result was mainly caused by the frequency
characteristics of the input. The acceleration response spectra of the seismic input and design
acceleration response spectra are plotted in Figure 9. The primary frequency of the SHW2 wave was
approximately 1.1 Hz, which was the closest to the natural frequency of the primary system (1 Hz).
In this situation, the primary structure vibrated the most and the particles collided violently, even if
the amplitude level was relatively low. Thus, the PTMD significantly dissipated the energy under
the SHW2 input.
However, the strongest components of the El Centro, Wenchuan, and Japan 311 waves were
concentrated at approximately 2, 6, and 6 Hz, respectively, which were significantly different from
the natural frequency of the primary structure.
Figure 8. Effects of the mass ratio of particles to the total auxiliary mass on the vibration reduction: (a) max-
imum acceleration and (b) root-mean-square (r.m.s.) acceleration.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Figure 9. Acceleration response spectra of the input motions and the design acceleration response spectra.
Although the frequency characteristics of the seismic input influenced the reduction effects of the
PTMD, Tables I and II show that the system responses were generally decreased by the PTMD to a
certain degree under different types of earthquakes, which indicates the robustness of the PTMD.
Tables I and II show that the reduction effects improved as the amplitude level of the input increased.
Thus, the larger the response of the primary structure, the better the reduction effects of the PTMD. For
example, the reduction effects of the maximum displacement and acceleration under the El Centro wave
(0.05 g) were only 10.79% and 4.17%, respectively; however, these values under the El Centro wave
(0.1 g) increased to 22.65% and 12.73%, respectively, because the response of the primary structure
was mild and the damper was not sufficiently shaken when the excitation energy was small. Under
these conditions, the particles moved chaotically rather than in a plug flow pattern [20], which
significantly weakened the vibration control effects. However, violent collisions occurred among the
particles and between the particles and the container as the input energy increased, which quickly
dissipated the input energy. This observation can also explain why the reduction effects under the
Wenchuan and Japan 311 waves did not improve as the seismic amplitude increased. Tables I and II
show that the responses under these two seismic waves were really small, and some responses (under
0.1 g) may have been smaller than those under the El Centro wave (0.05 g). Thus, PTMDs may have
more favorable potential applications in major or even larger earthquakes.
4.5. Effects of the buffered material

Rigid container walls are usually used in traditional particle dampers, which may generate relatively
large impact forces during collisions. Thus, several methods are proposed to decrease the noise level
and alleviate material degradation and local deformation from violent impacts. For example,
packaging the particles inside a soft bag to form a bean bag damper [32] and sticking the buffered
material onto the inner surface of the container walls are both efficient approaches.
In this experiment, rubber spacers with 10 mm width were stuck on the vertical inner walls of the
container and the performance of the PTMD with/without buffered material was compared.
Tables III and IV list the vibration reduction effects of the displacement and acceleration responses
at the roof of the test frame under different seismic inputs (0.1 g), including both the peak and r.m.s.
responses. The improvements in the vibration control effects from the buffered material can be
defined as follows: improvement = (response of controlled rigid structure response of controlled
structure with buffered material)/(response of controlled rigid structure) × 100%. The reduction
effects of the buffered PTMD were improved compared with conventional rigid PTMDs, with the
greatest improvement reaching 23.79%.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Z. LU ET AL.
Table III. Comparison of the vibration reduction effects of the particle tuned mass damper for the
displacement responses (mm) with/without buffered material under 0.1 g seismic input.
Uncontrolled 102.13 30.49 26.00 6.56 13.81 4.19 — —
Rigid 79.00 11.16 20.07 4.12 13.51 2.48 112.04 19.08
Buffered 76.72 10.82 18.32 3.58 12.10 1.89 107.45 18.21
Improvement (%) 2.89 3.05 8.72 13.11 10.44 23.79 4.10 4.56
Table IV. Comparison of the vibration reduction effects of the particle tuned mass damper for the
acceleration responses (g) with/without buffered material under 0.1 g seismic input.
Uncontrolled 0.5542 0.1302 0.4540 0.1240 0.2782 0.0720 — —

Rigid 0.4796 0.0600 0.4457 0.1148 0.2662 0.0665 0.6312 0.0775
Buffered 0.4411 0.0546 0.3986 0.0984 0.2357 0.0585 0.5955 0.0693
Improvement (%) 8.03 9.00 10.57 14.29 11.46 12.03 5.66 10.58
Li and Darby [33] investigated the influence of different types of buffered materials on the vibration
reduction effects of impact dampers and preliminarily found that the effects significantly depended on
the magnitude of the contact force and the contact time. In conclusion, buffered material can help
dissipate more energy than rigid PTMD, but this improvement is variable, and soft material with a
high coefficient of restitution is more preferable.
5. NUMERICAL SIMULATION
Considering that the theory of a single-particle damper is relatively well developed, a simplified
analytical solution in which the particles in a PTMD are equivalent to a single particle based on
certain principles is used to simulate the vibration reduction effects of PTMDs.
5.1. Simulation method

Based on the following equivalent principles [23], the particle group in the PTMD is replaced by a
single particle:
1. The container of the PTMD is a cuboid with a height that equals the diameter of the particles
(Dp), whereas the container of the single-particle damper is a cylinder, and its bottom diameter
equals the diameter of a single particle (D).
2. The void volume of the PTMD (Vepd) equals that of the single-particle damper (Veid).
3. The total mass of the particles in the PTMD (m) equals that of the single particle (mp).
4. The particles in both the PTMD and single-particle damper are spheres, and their densities are
kept constant as ρ.
The simplification diagram is shown in Figure 10. The simplified method is as follows:The volume
of particles in the PTMD Vspd can be obtained from Eq. (2):
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Figure 10. Diagrams of the particle tuned mass damper and equivalent single-particle damper.

Vspd ¼ 1 6
N πDp3 (2)
where N is the number of particles and N = m/m1p, and m1p is the mass of a single particle in the PTMD.
The void volume of the PTMD Vepd is
Vepd ¼ Vpd Vspd ¼ ð1=ρp 1ÞVspd (3)
where Vpd is the volume of the PTMD and ρp = Vspd/Vpd is the packing density of the PTMD.
The void volume of the single-particle damper Veid is

Veid ¼ π 12 D
3
þπ 4D
2
d (4)
where d is the clearance of the simplified single-particle damper.

Based on the equivalent principle (2), the clearance of the simplified single-particle damper can be
obtained from Eq. (5):
2
1 m mp π mp 3
1 ¼ þ 6 d (5)
ρp ρ 2ρ 4 πρ
The schematic diagram of the primary system with the equivalent PTMD is shown in Figure 11(a),
in which the subscripts c and p represent the container and the simplified particle, respectively. If the
primary structure is modeled in the solution as an n DOF vertical linear cantilever beam, then the
suspended container of the PTMD can be considered a single pendulum and as the (n + 1)th DOF.
The impact force from collisions between the simplified single particle and the container walls can
be seen as an external force Fp that acts on the container. The simplified computational model is
shown in Figure 11(b), in which the subscript i represents the ith floor and Fi is the seismic force
that acts on that floor.
Figure 11. Simplified diagram of the system: (a) primary structure with the equivalent particle tuned mass
damper and (b) simplified computational model.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Z. LU ET AL.
The governing equation of the primary system can be written as Eq. (6):
8
€ _
< MX þ CX þ KX ¼ E€x g þ ϕ ðcc y_ 1 þ k c y1 Þ
>
mc €x c þ cc y_ 1 þ k c y1 cp H ðy2 ; y_ 2 Þ k p Gðy2 Þ ¼ 0 (6)
>
:
mp €x p þ cp H ðy2 ; y_ 2 Þ þ k p Gðy2 Þ ¼ 0
M ¼ diag½ m1 m2 … mn (7)
2 3
c1 þ c2 c2
6 c c2 þ c3 c3 7
6 2 7
6 7
C¼6
6 c3 … 7
7 (8)
6 7
4 … cn 5
cn cn
2 3
k1 þ k2 k 2
6 k k2 þ k3 k 3 7
6 2 7
6 7
K¼6
6 k 3 … 7
7 (9)
6 7
4 … k n 5
k n kn
X ¼ ½ x1 x2 … x n T (10)
E ¼ ½ m1 m2 … mn T (11)
φ ¼ ½0 0 … 0 1 T (12)
where M, C, and K are the mass, damping, and stiffness matrices of the primary structure, respectively;
X is an n-dimensional displacement vector of the structure; E and €x g are the matrix-induced ground
acceleration and ground acceleration, respectively; and φ is an n-dimensional location vector of the
control force, whose nth component is 1 and the other components are 0. y1 is the relative
displacement of the container with respect to the primary system, that is, y1 = xc x5, and y2 is the
relative displacement of the simplified particle with respect to the container, that is, y2 = xp xc.
G(y2), and H ðy2 ; y_ 2 Þ [34] are nonlinear functions, as shown in Figure 12(a) and (b), respectively.
In addition, kc and cc represent the interactions between the container and the primary structure:
kc = ωc2mc, ωc = 2πfc, and fc = 1/(2π)(g/l)0.5, where l is the suspension length from the top of the
model to the barycenter of the container. kp and cp represent collisions between the particles and the
container. kp is the stiffness, where kp = ωp2mp, and the container can be simulated properly by
setting the appropriate value of ωp. cp is the damping coefficient, where cp = 2mpξ pωp, and is used to
simulate inelastic impacts, which range from completely plastic to elastic impacts, and the value of
any desired coefficient of restitution e can be obtained by setting the appropriate value of the
damping ratio ξ p, as shown in Figure 12(c) [21].
The vibration reduction effects of the PTMD were simulated using the software program MATLAB,
and the Runge–Kutta algorithm was used to solve the ordinary differential equations.
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Figure 12. Parameter relationship graph: (a) function G(y2), (b) function H ðy2 ; y_ 2 Þ, and (c) relationship be-
tween the damping ratio ξ p and coefficient of restitution e.
5.2. Parameter determination

In this simulation, 180 steel balls with 51 mm diameter (density of 7644 kg/m3) were equally placed
into 12 containers in two layers. For convenience, the behavior of the particles in each container
was assumed to be the same. Therefore, the impact forces on all the containers from collisions
between the particles and the containers could be calculated as the product of the number of
containers and the impact force of one container. Additionally, the initial displacement and velocity
were set as zero for convenience.
The parameters that were used in the numerical simulation are listed in Table V. The damping ratio
of the primary structure is 0.0025, and the other structural information of the primary structure is as
follows:
2 3
1200
6 7
6 1200 7
6 7
M¼6
6 1200 7kg
7 K
6 7
4 1200 5
2 1200 3
1; 063; 050 558; 390
6 558; 390 579; 530 7
6 1; 137; 820 7
6 7
¼6
6 579; 430 1; 158; 850 579; 420 7N=m
7
6 7
4 579; 420 1; 185; 850 606; 430 5
606; 430 606; 430
According to Masri and Ibrahim [34], when ωp ≥ 20ω1 (ω1 is the first-order frequency of the primary
structure), equivalent particles can properly simulate the interactions between the particles and the
container. Therefore, the circular frequency ωp was set as 20ω1. In addition, the coefficient of
restitution e of steel is 0.5, so the damping ratio ξ p was determined to be 0.2 according to Figure 12
(c). Moreover, the time step was set as 0.004 s.
Table V. System parameter values.

Mass (kg) Circular frequency (rad/s) Damping ratio
Container 39.345 6.28 0.10

Equivalent single particle 7.96 125.60 0.20
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
Z. LU ET AL.
Figure 13. Acceleration time histories at the top of the test structure with the particle tuned mass damper under
the (a) El Centro (0.2 g) and (b) SHW2 waves (0.05 g) and (c) zoom-in view of (a) and (d) zoom-in view of (b).
5.3. Comparison of the numerical and experimental results

Figure 13 shows the calculated and experimental results of the acceleration time histories at the top of
the test structure with the PTMD under the El Centro (0.2 g) and SHW2 waves (0.05 g). These results
generally matched, but some deviations existed between them at some intervals. PTMDs perform
nonlinearly under seismic excitation, but the proposed numerical simulation simplified the highly
nonlinear behavior of the particles to a certain extent. For example, the interactions between the
particles were not considered in the numerical simulation, so the collision, friction, and jump
behaviors of the particles could not be simulated. Nonetheless, this method can estimate the
tendencies of a system’s motion with acceptable accuracy.
In addition, a comparison of the calculated and experimental results of the peak acceleration and
peak displacement responses at the top of the test structure with the PTMD under four inputs is
listed in Table VI. The errors were limited within an acceptable range, which indicates that the
Table VI. Comparison of the calculated and experimental results for the peak acceleration and displacement
response on top of the test structure with the particle tuned mass damper.
Acceleration (m/s2) Displacement (mm)
Input (g) Calculation Experiment Error (%) Calculation Experiment Error (%)
El Centro (0.1) 0.4899 0.4796 2.15 80.9500 79.0030 2.46
Wenchuan (0.1) 0.4280 0.4540 5.73 21.9297 20.0658 9.29
Japan 311 (0.1) 0.2548 0.2682 4.99 12.7873 13.5102 5.35
SHW2 (0.05) 0.2749 0.2751 0.07 54.2773 55.9410 8.84
DOI: 10.1002/eqe
simplified numerical simulation method that was proposed in this paper can yield relatively accurate
estimates of the peak response, especially for the acceleration responses. The maximum acceleration
response is an important controlling index in the design of buildings that are regulated by Chinese
codes because excessive acceleration may cause discomfort in occupants.
6. CONCLUSIONS
A new PTMD that combines various energy dissipation methods from both TMDs and particle dampers
was proposed in this paper. A series of shaking table tests with a five-story steel frame that had a PTMD
attached were conducted to investigate the system’s performance, and a parametric study was conducted.
According to the experimental and numerical analyses, the following conclusions can be drawn:
1. The maximum and r.m.s. responses of the five-story structure were reduced by attaching the new
PTMD under both onsite earthquake excitations and artificial waves. The reduction effects were
extremely favorable under the Shanghai artificial wave, which indicates that the vibration reduc-
tion effects improved the closer the frequency of the seismic input to that of the primary structure.
Additionally, the vibration reduction effects improved as the amplitude level of the earthquake
excitations increased. The PTMD still exhibited certain vibration control effects under other seis-
mic inputs, which suggests the robustness of the PTMD.
2. The PTMD effectively and stably suppresses the first-mode vibrations of MDOF structures.
However, the reduction effects for higher vibration modes are less satisfactory. Thus, multiple
dampers can be installed in the positions of the maximum responses that correspond to each high
mode to control the high modes’ vibrations.
3. Increasing the auxiliary mass ratio can improve the damping effects nonlinearly but has a limit.
Thus, the optimal auxiliary mass ratio can be chosen when designing PTMD. Similarly, the gap
clearance of PTMDs has an optimal range in which the responses of the PTMD are stable and
efficient, which optimizes the vibration control effects. Moreover, increasing the particle mass
can improve the reduction effects, provided that the total auxiliary mass ratio is constant. In ad-
dition, buffered material can help dissipate more energy than rigid PTMDs and thus increase the
vibration control efficiency and decrease noise, but this improvement is variable.
4. The experimental and numerical results generally matched according to the numerical analysis.
The proposed equivalent analytical method proved to be feasible because this approach can pre-
dict the motion trends with an acceptable accuracy and provide reasonably accurate estimates of
the maximum response. Although these results slightly deviated from the experimental results,
this method still has certain practical value in the actual design of PTMDs because of its simple
principles and convenient operation. However, further comprehensive studies and more accurate
numerical methods are required to measure the precise performance of structures with PTMDs
under seismic excitation, especially considering the influence of collisions between particles.
In conclusion, the responses of an MDOF structure model can be significantly reduced by attaching
a lightweight PTMD on top of the primary structure. PTMDs can be regarded as a new type of passive
control device whose improvements are based on TMDs. This device is featured in various dissipation
approaches and provides an avenue for the application of particle dampers. Therefore, PTMDs may
have many potential applications in the control of full-scale buildings in civil engineering.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China through grant 51478361 is highly
appreciated. This work was also supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Government
Supported Universities.
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EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING & STRUCTURAL DYNAMICS

Earthquake Engng Struct. Dyn. 2016

Experimental and analytical study on the performance of particle

Zheng Lu1,2, Xiaoyi Chen2, Dingchang Zhang2 and Kaoshan Dai1,2,*,†

Received 24 May 2016; Revised 17 August 2016; Accepted 9 September 2016

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

2. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP AND PROCEDURE

3.1. Peak and root-mean-square responses

Table I. Displacement responses at the roof of the test frame (mm).

3.2. Time history responses

3.3. Peak responses at every ﬂoor

3.4. Frequency domain responses

4.1. Effects of the auxiliary mass ratio

4.2. Effects of gap clearance

4.5. Effects of the buffered material

Uncontrolled 0.5542 0.1302 0.4540 0.1240 0.2782 0.0720 — —

5.1. Simulation method

Vepd ¼ Vpd Vspd ¼ ð1=ρp 1ÞVspd (3)

where d is the clearance of the simpliﬁed single-particle damper.

E ¼ ½ m1 m2 … mn T (11)

5.2. Parameter determination

Table V. System parameter values.

Container 39.345 6.28 0.10

5.3. Comparison of the numerical and experimental results

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