Solutions to Design Displacements of Base Isolation Code in Taiwan

Base isolation is a new seismic design concept which lessens the seismic responses of the superstructure during earthquake ground motions. It has been proven that base isolators possess good earthquake-proof benefits through theoretical, experimental and recorded data demonstrations. However, it is a very important issue for engineering professions to easily design the base isolators. The Ministry of the Interior in Taiwan promulgates a series of code provisions for the base isolation technologies after the 921 Chi-Chi earthquake. In this study, we propose new design procedures for the design displacements of elastomeric rubber bearings and friction pendulum systems based on solving the polynomial function of the design displacement. In order to prove the accuracy of the proposed method, we compare the computed results by the proposed design method with those through the traditional iteration design procedure of the design displacement according to the base isolation design code in Taiwan. A good agreement between the proposed design method and the traditional iteration design procedure has been obtained and verified in this study.