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Fabrication of 3D Carbon Microelectromechanical Systems C-MEMS
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Evaluating Post-Earthquake Building Safety Using Economical MEMS Seismometers.
Ting-Yu Hsu1, Ren-Cheng Yin2, Yih-Min Wu3
1Department of Civil and Construction Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei 10607, Taiwan. tyhsu@mail.ntust.edu.tw.
Sensors (Basel, Switzerland)
|May 9, 2018
Summary
P-Alert, an economical accelerometer for earthquake early warning (EEW), effectively assesses post-earthquake building safety. Shaking table tests confirmed its ability to detect building-wide damage, with potential for story-level localization.
Area of Science:
- Engineering
- Seismology
- Structural Health Monitoring
Background:
- Commercial structural health monitoring (SHM) systems are often prohibitively expensive, limiting their widespread application in buildings.
- The National Taiwan University's EEW-research group developed P-Alert, a cost-effective microelectromechanical system-based accelerometer for earthquake early warning (EEW).
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the performance of the P-Alert system for assessing post-earthquake building safety.
- To determine if P-Alert can effectively gauge potential damage levels in steel-frame structures.
Main Methods:
- Conducted incremental damage steel-frame shaking table tests.
- Utilized fragility curves for different damage levels.
- Calculated interstory drift ratios from P-Alert sensor acceleration data (double integration and filtering).
Main Results:
- P-Alert demonstrated acceptable detection of damage for entire buildings.
- The system successfully correlated acceleration data with seismic damage levels.
Conclusions:
- P-Alert is a viable and economical tool for evaluating post-earthquake building safety.
- Future improvements in sensor synchronization could enable damage localization within building stories.
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