Experimental characterization on cyclic stability behavior of a high-damping viscoelastic damper

This study explores the mechanical behavior of a viscoelastic damper (VED) under monotonic and cyclic loading, focusing on the cyclic stability of VEDs' mechanical properties. The studied VED consists of 2 layers of elastomer compound sandwiched between 3 steel plates. The elastomer compound used in this study is designed to provide high damping capacity with relatively low stiffness. Nine damper specimens are manufactured, and each specimen is subjected to monotonic or cyclic loading to investigate the effects of strain amplitude, loading frequency, strain history, and high-cycle fatigue loading on the mechanical properties of VED. Hysteretic responses for each loading condition are obtained, and the variations of maximum force, storage shear modulus, loss shear modulus, dissipated energy, loss factor, and equivalent viscous damping ratio with different test parameters are examined. The experimental results show that VED can achieve a maximum shear strain amplitude of 543% under monotonic loading, and has low frequency dependency under cyclic dynamic loading. The VED has superior energy dissipation capacity with a maximum viscous damping ratio of up to 30%. The preloading strain history has a significant effect on the cyclic stability behavior of the VED. Furthermore, the high-cycle fatigue performance is sensitive to both loading strain amplitude and loading frequency.

Automated summary

This study investigates the mechanical behavior of a viscoelastic damper (VED) under monotonic and cyclic loading, with a focus on the cyclic stability of VEDs' mechanical properties. The VED consists of 2 layers of elastomer compound sandwiched between 3 steel plates. Nine damper specimens are tested to examine the effects of strain amplitude, loading frequency, strain history, and high-cycle fatigue loading on the mechanical properties of VED. The experimental results demonstrate that VED has a high damping capacity, low frequency dependency, and significant sensitivity to strain amplitude and loading frequency in high-cycle fatigue performance.