Study on seismic performance of base-isolated and base-fixed Ancient timber buildings in hanging-wall/footwall Earthquakes

This study aims to quantify effects of hanging-wall/footwall fault parameters on dynamic responses of base-isolated and base-fixed ancient timber buildings. Finite element models of a real timber building with and without isolation technology are first built and verified by comparison with existing studies. Fitting analysis of three typical models, Abrahamson-Silva-Kamai, Campbell-Bozorgnia and Chiou-Youngs models, as well as 622 recorded ground motions, is then conducted to determine the optimal model to generate earthquake waves. Finally, effects of hanging-wall/footwall fault parameters on seismic performance of the based-isolated and base-fixed buildings are investigated. The results show that the Abrahamson-Silva-Kamai model achieves the best fitting results with the lowest computational errors. Isolation technology can improve seismic performance for ancient timber buildings with different ages. Isolation effectiveness of the base-isolated models decreases with increasing building ages in different fault parameters. The isolation effectiveness remains unchanged with different fault dip angles in footwall earthquakes, whereas it decreases with the increase of fault dip angles in hanging-wall earthquakes at the same site distance. The structural isolation effectiveness in hanging-wall earthquakes is better than that in footwall earthquakes.