Comparison of different distributions of viscous damper properties in asymmetric-plan frames

In this article, one of the procedures to design viscous dampers proposed in literature is applied to 3D asymmetricplan buildings, considering different distributions for the damping coefficients, which are assumed to be proportional to specific structural or response parameters. The main purpose was to investigate the effectiveness of different vertical and in-plan distributions of the damping coefficients of nonlinear viscous dampers for the seismic retrofit of existing buildings. For comparison purposes, all the distributions were applied utilizing both a simplified and an extended method for the 3D structures, where the simplified method takes into account only the translation in the seismic direction, and the extended method considers the translations along the two orthogonal directions together with the floor rotations. The proposed distributions were then applied to a typical case study involving an asymmetric-plan six-storey RC building. The effectiveness of the different distributions was examined through time-history analyses, assuming nonlinear behaviour for both the viscous dampers and the structural elements. The results of the nonlinear dynamic analyses were examined in terms of maximum and residual inter-storey drifts, peak floor accelerations and maximum damper forces.