Equivalent mechanical models of tuned liquid dampers with different tank geometries

This paper focuses on the development of equivalent mechanical models for tuned liquid dampers (TLDs) with rectangular, vertical-cylindrical, horizontal-cylindrical, and hyperboloid (conical) tank shapes under external excitation in the transverse direction. Potential flow theory is utilized to obtain the free-surface response amplitude and the corresponding velocity of the sloshing liquid and Lagrange’s equations are used to determine the generalized properties. Morison’s equation and the virtual work method are used to estimate an equivalent viscous damping ratio based on the screen loss coefficient. The equivalent mechanical properties derived in this paper model the fundamental sloshing mode only and are restricted to small response amplitudes. Subsequently, the equivalent mechanical properties including effective mass, natural frequency, and damping ratio of the TLDs, having different tank geometries, are compared. It is found that the effective mass values for horizontal-cylindrical and hyperboloid TLDs are larger than the effective mass values for vertical-cylindrical and rectangular TLDs. The increased effective mass values for horizontal-cylindrical and hyperboloid TLDs can result in improved tuned liquid damper performance given the same total liquid mass as that of rectangular or vertical-cylindrical TLDs.