Assessing the performance of a high damping rubber bearing in beyond-design conditions

In the recent past, passive isolation systems have been largely employed as a valuable earthquake-resistant strategy in the design of civil engineering structures, particularly with reference to the large class of ordinary buildings. Although their introduction for the seismic protection of strategic buildings is currently still limited, base isolation systems are likely to become a widespread solution in the design of structures and facilities for which superior performances are needed against design actions and functionality after a seismic event is of utmost importance. The present paper is focused on evaluation of the performance of a filled high damping rubber bearing in limit state conditions. Suitable finite element models have been developed by employing the mesh overlapping technique. Some initial results are shown and compared with the outcomes of an experimental campaign.