Novel STRP-SR and Maglev Seismic Isolators

Conventional base isolators present two main issues: 1) a high cost of production, and 2) the presence of a certain amount of horizontal lateral stiffness. To address these issues, this paper introduces two novel base isolators called Scrap Tire Rubber Pad with Steel Rods (STRP-SR) isolator and Magnetic Levitated (Maglev) isolator. To reduce the production cost, the STRP-SR isolator consisting of bonded piled up scrap tire pads accompanied by four steel rods is introduced, which could be used in light buildings with a low ranking of importance. To provide an ideal bearing with zero horizontal lateral stiffness, the Maglev isolator is introduced, in which the building is levitated with a zero- carbon footprint using magnetic levitation technology. In this paper, the STRP-SR bearing was examined numerically under compressive and cyclic shear loadings and the efficiency of the STRP-SR bearing was investigated for an isolated two-storey building model using ABAQUS software. Moreover, the Maglev bearing was studied numerically using COMSOL software and its experimental specimen was tested on a shaking table. Based on the obtained numerical results, it was concluded that STRP-SR and Maglev bearings can reduce the absolute acceleration and displacement values by average percentages of 53.24 and 100, respectively, which highlights their capability in keeping isolated buildings safe. The experimental results for the Maglev isolator showed that the aforementioned reduction percentage was reduced to an average value of 74.67%, which still is an acceptable value for the efficiency of a practical bearing.