Energy Absorbing Capacity of Shock Absorbers Combining Rubber and Steel Pipes

摘要

The authors studied the basic characteristics of steel pipes by experiments and analyses, aiming to determine whether steel pipes can be used as shock absorbers. The results of the study proved that steel pipes have enough energy-absorbing capacity to be used as shock absorbers. The authors then made nonlinear response analyses to examine the effect of attaching rectangular rubber and steel pipes as shock absorbers to base-isolated bridges. The analyses showed that when steel-pipe shock absorbers are used alone, the collision force acting between adjacent girders of bridges increases rapidly after the steel pipes fail. The authors conducted static loading tests to the new type of shock absorbers, which use steel pipes wrapped with rubber pipes. From the result, the load-displacement characteristics can be estimated from the basic characteristics of rubber and steel pipes, and the restoration of rubber can decrease the collision force after the steel pipe fails. The authors investigated which dimension of the shock absorber can possess relatively high energy absorbing capacity and collsion force reducing effect.