Design of Tuned Mass Dampers via Harmony Search for Different Optimization Objectives of Structures

Abstract

In this chapter, an optimization methodology for tuning of tuned mass dampers (TMDs) on seismic structures was presented for two different objectives such as reducing the displacement of first story and absolute acceleration of top story of the structure. A metaheuristic method; harmony search (HS) was employed for optimization according to the time history analyses of structure under several earthquake excitations. Harmony search inspires musical performances in order to find optimum design variables according to optimization objective.Step by step, the methodology of the optimization process is explained in the chapter. The method was applied to find an optimum TMD for a seven story shear building and the optimum results were compared for the two cases considering displacement objective and acceleration objective. According to the results, optimum TMDs for both objectives are effective on both displacements and accelerations. But for acceleration objective, a small benefit for accelerations can be seen although the optimum mass of TMD is very heavy according to displacement objective.