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Friction Pendulum System (FPS)

Caption:

The Friction Pendulum System (FPS) which enables buildings to ride out an earthquake by gently swaying back and forth, is installed in this six-story model before being placed on a shake table for testing at the National Center of Earthquake Engineering Research.

Important: Use of this image is restricted. Please see “Restrictions” (below) for complete information.

More About this Image:
In the 1990's, the National Science Foundation (NSF) Earthquake Hazard Mitigation Program (EHMP), part of the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP), supported a project called the National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (NCEER). Headquartered at the State University of New York at Buffalo, a major research focus of this center was structural retrofit.

Engineers and researchers at NCEER developed the Friction Pendulum System (FPS), a method that would allow a 60,000-ton building to ride out a quake by gently swaying back and forth like a pendulum. The new FPS was put into effect for the first time in San Francisco's historic U.S. Court of Appeals. Completed in about 1905, the structure is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and contains ornamental statuary inside and out and architectural elegance from the period. The question of how to make the building safe during future earthquakes arose after it was damaged in the Loma Prieta quake of 1989.

Having gone through 5 years of prior testing, the architects and engineers who proposed the use of the FPS were very confident that it would do well in protecting certain structures when there is extremely strong seismic excitation. Based on their confidence in the system, the owner of the courthouse, the U.S. General Services Administration, chose to use it over other possible earthquake prediction devices.

NSF continues to support earthquake engineering research through programs like the Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) project, funded under the NSF Major Research Equipment Program.

Friction Pendulum System (FPS)
(Preview Only)

Credit: Courtesy National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research
Decade of Image: 1990 - 1999

Categories:

ENGINEERING / Earthquake Engineering

Formats Available:

JPEG Format - 2.79M - 813 x 1200 pixel image - 300 DPI

Restrictions:

Warning: This image can only be used for private, educational, and non-profit purposes. Permission to use in any commercial vehicle, or in any for-profit manner is strictly prohibited.

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Last Modified: Mar 29, 2001