Seismic performance of glulam frame with friction damper and column shoe: Experimental investigation and simplified numerical model

Resilient timber structure is a new branch of structure design. To reduce seismic damage of timber structures, an innovative resilient glulam frame (IRF) with friction dampers and column shoes was proposed in this paper. The IRF was connected by use of beam-to-column joints with friction dampers and column-base joints with column shoes. An IRF specimen and a conventional glulam frame (CF) specimen, with a scale ratio of 1:2, were tested under reversed cyclic load. The failure modes, hysteretic curves, stiffness degradation, and energy dissipation capacity of the specimens were obtained. Results indicated that the IRF was low-damage except replaceable Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) strips tensile failure. The load-carrying capacity of IRF did not significantly change compared to the CF specimen, but the energy dissipation capacity was enhanced by approximately 100%. A simplified numerical model of timber frames was developed and validated, and then the time-history analysis of multi-story IRF structure was performed. It was further demonstrated that the adoption of IRF significantly reduced the maximum story drift and residual drift of structures, especially during severe earthquakes.