Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

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Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics

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A method to generate dynamic vibration absorber load combinations

J.S. Love *, Z.J. Taylor
RWDI Inc., 600 Southgate Drive, Guelph, ON N1G 4P6, Canada

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Dynamic vibration absorbers (DVAs) in the form of tuned mass dampers (TMDs) and tuned sloshing dampers
Load combinations (TSDs) are commonly employed to reduce structural accelerations during common wind events. Since the loads
Principal component analysis are applied in multiple directions, and may be produced by multiple DVAs, the generation of load combinations
Dynamic vibration absorber
that envelop all expected DVA loads applied to the structure is a challenging task. A method is presented that
Tuned mass damper
Tuned sloshing damper
employs principal component analysis to transform the DVA loading time series into M orthogonal principal
Wind loading components (PCs). By normalizing the PC time series, the loading envelop can be represented as an M-sphere (M-
dimensional hypersphere). M-dimensional geometric objects (polytopes) are required to envelop the M-sphere.
The coordinates of the polytope’s vertices, when converted back into the original loading coordinates, represent
the load combinations. The method is applied to wind tunnel test data as well as monitoring data collected from
two anonymous buildings equipped with multiple DVAs. The method reduces the dimensionality of the problem
by eliminating PCs that do not contribute significantly to the response. The results demonstrate that if efficient
polytopes are chosen, the conservatism associated with the load combinations can be reduced by employing a
larger number of load combinations.

1. Introduction
Construction of tall buildings with large aspect ratios (height-to-
width) has proliferated in recent years, which has led to many structures
that are susceptible to excessive wind-induced dynamic motion. As a
result, dynamic vibration absorbers (DVAs) in the form of tuned mass
dampers (TMDs), and tuned sloshing dampers (TSDs) have become
increasingly popular to efficiently reduce structural motion. These de-
vices can be represented as an auxiliary spring-mass-dashpot oscillator
coupled to the primary structure near its position of maximum modal
deflection (typically near the top of a building) (McNamara, 1977). The
performance of a DVA is maximized by selecting the proper DVA natural
frequency and damping ratio (Warburton, 1982). When the structure
oscillates, the DVA mass also begins to oscillate, but out-of-phase with
the motion of the structure. The DVA thereby applies a force back onto
the structure that opposes its motion.
A TMD consists of a mass - typically composed of steel or concrete -
that is mechanically connected to the structure by components that
provide a restoring force and damping. Gravity is most often made to
function as the restoring force by suspending the mass from cables to
create a pendulum. The damping may be provided by various types of
linear or nonlinear viscous damping devices. A TSD consists of a large
tank that is rigidly connected to the structure and partially filled with a
liquid (typically water) that is free to slosh. The tank dimensions are
selected to provide the proper natural sloshing frequency, and damping
devices in the form of screens, poles, or baffles are typically added to
increase the liquid damping closer to its optimal value (Tait, 2008). Since
TMDs and TSDs are typically nonlinear, time domain simulations are
required to verify performance and determine design level loads.
The structural motion reduction provided by a properly designed
DVA increases as the DVA mass increases. For this reason, it is sometimes
necessary to employ multiple TMD masses or multiple TSD tanks to
simultaneously achieve the required DVA performance, while conform-
ing to space restrictions that frequently arise near the top of buildings.
For example, multiple stacked TSD tanks may provide the most efficient
space layout, or TMD masses located in opposite corners of a building
may be necessary to avoid interference with the structure’s core. When
multiple independent masses are employed, designers may tune all DVAs
to be identical, or they may be designed to have slightly different tuning
ratios, which has been shown to provide superior motion reduction
performance and robustness (Kareem and Kline, 1995; Xu and Igusa,
1992). While such a DVA system may provide improved performance, the
presence of multiple secondary oscillators coupled to the primary struc-
ture increases the complexity of the loading scenarios that should be

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: Shayne.Love@rwdi.com (J.S. Love).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jweia.2019.103977
Received 9 February 2019; Received in revised form 16 July 2019; Accepted 12 August 2019
Available online 19 September 2019
0167-6105/© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

considered for the strength design of the system.

The dynamic response of a structure subjected to wind loading can be
approximated as a classic random vibration problem. The response of
lightly damped oscillators is often narrowband, which has traditionally
enabled the Davenport peak factor (Davenport, 1964) to be applied to
determine the largest expected peak for a stationary response over a
specified duration (often 1 h). There are numerous additional method-
ologies available to determine the expected peak of a scalar time series
(Peng et al., 2014; Preumont, 1985). These methods can be employed to
determine the peak design load for a scalar response quantity, such as the
peak force that a DVA is expected to apply to the structure in the x-di-
rection. However, loads are applied as vectors. Therefore, it is necessary
to understand not only the peak scalar responses (in the x-, y-, and
z-directions, for example), but also how these scalar forces act together to
affect the structure. To avoid conducting lengthy time domain simula- Fig. 1. Sketch of DVAs on structure.
tions on the structural model, several equivalent static load combinations
are typically desired by structural engineers. It is therefore necessary to
F yi ðtÞ ¼  myi€yi ðtÞ (2)
develop realistic and efficient load combinations that capture the worst
loading scenarios. The efficiency of a set of load combinations can be
where a dot above a variable denotes a time derivative. The structure
assessed by considering: (i) how closely the loading envelope is captured,
must be designed to resist all loads that the DVAs are expected to apply to
and (ii) how many combinations are employed. Generally, as the number
the structure. It is impractical to apply a time series of all the loads that
of load combinations is increased the loading envelope can be better
the DVAs could produce over the lifetime of the structure and ensure that
approximated. If more DVAs are present in a structure, the number of
no structural components are ever overstressed. Instead, it is necessary to
load combinations that must be considered would be expected to in-
envelope all possible loads and examine stress on the structure using a
crease. However, to the authors’ knowledge, a method to generate
relatively small number of equivalent static load combinations. It should
realistic load combinations has not been proposed.
be clear that it is not only the summation of the loads that is of interest.
In this paper, a methodology is presented to generate DVA load
For example, the difference between the y-direction DVA loading shown
combinations from time series data of structure-DVA systems. The pro-
in Fig. 1 will produce a torque to the structure, which must also be
posed method is used to determine direct DVA load actions, and can
considered in the design.
therefore be used to conduct the strength design of the local structure
A conservative approach to generate load cases would be to deter-
supporting the DVA. First, the DVA loading vectors, which may consist of
mine the maximum and minimum load applied in each direction by each
multiple DVAs each applying loads in multiple directions, can be
DVA, and assume the peaks occur simultaneously. The load combinations
decomposed into their principal components (PCs) using principal
generated would correspond to every combination of maximum or
component analysis (PCA). From these PCs, it may be possible to reduce
minimum forces in each direction. This method will clearly result in the
the dimensions of the problem by eliminating PCs that have low signal
generation of very conservative load combinations in most cases. In the
variance, which can substantially reduce the complexity of the analysis
next sections, a method is outlined to enable the generation of more
and the number of load combinations that need to be considered. Next,
realistic load cases based on the response characteristics of the DVAs.
the remaining PCs are normalized and a method is presented to envelop
the response using convex polytopes (Coxeter, 1969, 1973). The vertices
2.2. Principal component analysis (PCA)
of the enveloping polytope are transformed back into the original loading
coordinates to produce load combinations. To demonstrate the method, it
Principal component analysis (PCA) is employed to simplify the
is applied to wind tunnel test data for one structure equipped with DVAs,
ensuing generation of load combinations. PCA (often referred to as
as well as structural monitoring data collected from two real-world DVA
proper orthogonal decomposition) has previously been employed to
installations. The monitoring data was collected during common wind
interpret data sets in wind engineering including meteorology, fluid
events, and does not represent the design level loads; nevertheless, the
dynamics, aerodynamics, structural dynamics, and aeroelasticity (Solari
load combinations generated from the data are demonstrative. While the
et al., 2007; Carassale et al., 2007; Taylor et al., 2013). In this section,
focus of this paper is loads exerted on the structure by DVAs, the method
PCA is briefly described by referring to a 2D problem that provides a
may be generalized to other forms of vectorized loading data.
simple geometric interpretation of the process. PCA is a statistical tech-
nique that is used to identify patterns maximizing the variance of the
2. Methodology
original data set. It employs linear eigenvalue transformations to convert
the original loading vector into uncorrelated principal components (PCs).
2.1. Problem definition
A PC with a large eigenvalue indicates the pattern contributes signifi-
cantly to the total variance, however if a PC has a small corresponding
A structure is equipped with one or more DVAs, as shown in Fig. 1.
eigenvalue, it may be possible to neglect it without significant loss of
The structure can move in the X-, and Y-directions, while the displace-
information to the original data set.
ment of the ith DVA is identified as xi(t) and yi(t). The equivalent mass of
The DVA loads are represented by matrix Q with dimensions of N x n
the ith DVA in the X- and Y-directions are mxi , and myi , respectively; note
where n is the number of observations or time steps and N is the number
that mxi , and myi , are not necessarily equal. The equations of motion of
structure-DVA systems have been extensively reported, and are therefore of degrees of freedom. Therefore, each column is the vector ! q ðt Þ ¼ j

not repeated herein (see for example Ref. (Soong and Dargush, 1997)).
After the time domain response of the system is determined, the load that
the ith DVA applies to the structure is calculated as the product of the
DVA mass and the acceleration of its centre of mass
F xi ðtÞ ¼  mxi€xi ðtÞ (1)
½q1 ðtj Þ…qN ðtj ÞT where qi(tj) is the ith load component exerted by the DVA
at time, tj. Herein, it is assumed that the mean of these original loads has
been removed and is to be added back in at the end of the process. Some
load components may be correlated, as shown in Fig. 2(a) for a 2D case.
In PCA, the objective is to re-express the loads as uncorrelated orthogonal
components given by ! u ðt Þ ¼ ½u ðt Þ…u ðt ÞT . The objective is now to
j 1 j N j
find a transformation matrix, P, to transform the original load

2
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor
Fig. 2. Example of using PCA to eliminate correlation (a) original data, (b)
PC data.
components, Q into an orthogonal set (its principal components), U ac-
cording to:
U ¼ PQ
Each row of the transformation matrix, P can be computed as an
eigenvector of the covariance matrix of the original data set, Q. There-
fore, the transformation matrix P has dimensions N x N to produce an
uncorrelated data set (or principal components), U with dimensions N x
n. The eigenvalues correspond to the variance of the original data set in
the direction of the associated eigenvector; eigenvalues with large
magnitudes suggest that the associated eigenvector is an important un-
derlying structure to the original data set. For this reason, the eigen-
vectors and eigenvalues are typically re-ordered such that the
eigenvalues are decreasing; that is, the most important PCs are first. As
shown in Fig. 2(b), the original correlated data set (q1(t), q2(t)) is
transformed into a new uncorrelated data set (u1(t), u2(t)). Fig. 2(b) also
shows that only one variable (u1(t)) is necessary to describe the data set,
since it has a large variance compared to the variance of u2(t). This
elimination of a degree of freedom, and the generation of uncorrelated
signals will prove to be advantageous to developing load combinations.
The original data set is reconstructed by pre-multiplying Eq. (3) by the
matrix transpose of orthogonal matrix P:
Q ¼ PT U
~ ¼P~T U
~ where the ~ represents an
or reasonably approximated using Q
~ has
approximation through elimination of degrees of freedom (i.e., P
dimensions M x N where M < N, U ~ has dimensions M x n, and Q ~ di-
mensions remain N x n). It will be shown that it is advantageous to
develop load combinations using this uncorrelated data set, and then
convert the load combinations back into the coordinates of the original
data set.
Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977
2.3. Loads in M-Dimensions
In the previous section, the original loads were transformed into their
principal components, the uncorrelated data set, U. U consists of M scalar
time series that are linear combinations of the original loads. The ex-
pected maximum, b u i and minimum, u i of the ith PC time series is deter-
mined using any suitable procedure for analyzing time domain data
(Peng et al., 2014). The "centre", μi and "radius", ri of the ith PC is then
determined as (this selection of nomenclature will become clear later):
1
μi ¼ ðbu i þ ui Þ (5)
2
1
u i  ui Þ
ri ¼ ðb (6)
2
The PCs may then be normalized to produce:
ui ðtÞ  μi
ni ðtÞ ¼ (7)
ri
When all normalized PCs, n1(t) to nM(t), are plotted in M-space, the
result will be an M-dimensional hypersphere, also called an M-sphere,
with unity radius, and centred on the origin (Coxeter, 1973). The domain
of expected loads is described (in the normalized PC coordinate system)
by the inequality:
X
M
n2i  1 (8)
i¼1
while the loading envelope is described by the equality:
X
M
n2i ¼ 1 (9)
i¼1
The loading envelope described by Eq. (9) clearly represents an
infinite number of points. It is necessary to select discrete points that
(3)
bound the M-sphere specified by Eq. (9). After these points are selected,
the jth bounding point, pj ¼ ðej1 …ejM Þ is converted back into the original
PCs using
uji ¼ eji ri þ μi (10)
and then the points are converted from the PC coordinates into the
original loading coordinates using Eq. (4). The challenge is now to
determine how to efficiently bound an M-sphere using a discrete number
of points.
2.4. Bounding the M-Sphere
Using PCA and algebraic manipulation, the problem of developing
load combinations has been reduced to determining discrete points, pj
that will efficiently bound an M-sphere. This problem is trivial in 1D (a
line), is straightforward in 2D (a circle), but becomes considerably more
complex in 3D (a sphere) and higher dimensions (an M-sphere). The
complexity in 3D and higher dimensions arises because of the large
number of different polytopes that can bound the M-sphere. A "polytope"
(4)
is a geometric object with "flat" sides; a polygon is a polytope in 2D, while
a polyhedron is a polytope in 3D, but polytopes exist in higher di-
mensions as well. It is not always clear which polytope will most effi-
ciently bound the M-sphere. In this section, higher dimensional geometry
is employed, as well as some additional geometric concepts, and, while
basic definitions are given, more background information on the subject
can be found in Coxeter (1969, 1973).
In geometry, the largest M-sphere that can fit inside a given M-
dimensional convex polytope is defined as the insphere, and its radius is
3
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

the inradius, rin. The normalization adopted in the previous section en-
sures that the inradius of the convex polytope selected should be unity
(rin ¼ 1). The smallest M-sphere that will wholly contain the convex
polytope is defined as the circumsphere, whose radius is the circum-
radius, rout. Therefore, the circumradius must be greater than the inra-
dius. Fig. 3 illustrates the inradius and circumradius for the 2D case.
Intuitively, the circumradius should provide a measure of the con-
servativism of the selected load cases. The more points that are selected
to envelop the M-sphere (that is, the more load combinations that are
employed), the closer the circumradius will be to the inradius (that is, the
less conservative the load combinations will be) if the points are effi-
ciently selected. In the following subsections, a few 2-, 3-, 4-, and M-
dimensional polytopes are presented. These polytopes are expected to be
reasonably efficient shapes for bounding the M-sphere, although further
investigation may reveal more efficient shapes.
Fig. 4. Reduction of conservatism versus the number of load combina-
tions (M ¼ 2).
2.4.1. Case: M ¼ 2
For the 2D case, the smallest circumradius for a given number of
a) 12 Vertices - Regular Icosahedron
points is obtained when the points are spaced equally around the circle. If
the number of load combinations desired is C, the angle, α between
The regular icosahedron is a polyhedron consisting of 20 equilateral
sequential cases is α ¼ 2π =C, and the circumradius is rout ¼ rin =
triangle faces and 12 vertices as displayed in Fig. 5(a). Cartesian co-
cosðα=2Þ . If θj ¼ 2π j=C are the equally spaced angles, the load cases are
ordinates of the vertices (normalized to have unity inradius) are the
given by:
permutations of (0, 1.07, 0.66), (0.66, 0, 1.07), (1.07, 0.66, 0)
  as defined in Coxeter (1973). The ratio of the circumradius to inradius is
ej1 ; ej2 ¼ ðrout cosθj ; rout sinθj Þ (11)
approximately 1.26.
Fig. 4 plots the ratio of rout =rin  1 versus the number of load com- Note that selecting a polyhedron with a larger number of vertices does
binations, C employed. When very few load combinations are considered, not necessarily decrease the circumradius. For example, the regular do-
the addition of more load combination can reduce the conservatism decahedron consists of 12 pentagon faces and 20 vertices, yet the cir-
substantially. However, as more load combinations are added, this rate cumradius is identical to that of the regular icosahedron with only 12
decreases. vertices. The regular icosahedron is therefore a more efficient shape since
the same measure of conservatism is maintained even though it has 40%
2.4.2. Case: M ¼ 3 fewer load cases.
For the 3D case, there are numerous polyhedra that are available to
envelop the sphere. Herein, polyhedra with 12 and 24 vertices are pre- b) 24 Vertices - Rhombicuboctahedron
sented. Further research may reveal that more efficient polyhedra are
available. A rhombicuboctahedron (or cantellated cube) is displayed in
Fig. 5(b), which consists of 24 vertices and 26 faces composed of squares
and triangles. Cartesian coordinates of the vertices are the permutations
of (0.41, 0.41, 1), (0.41, 1, 0.41), (1, 0.41, 0.41). The
ratio of the circumradius to inradius is approximately 1.15. Therefore,
doubling the loads cases from 12 to 24 - by selecting a rhombicubocta-
hedron instead of a regular icosahedron - will decrease the conservatism
of the load combinations by approximately 11%.

2.4.3. Case: M ¼ 4
Although visualizing polytopes above three dimensions is chal-
lenging, the geometry and algebra required to define polytopes in 4D is
only slightly more complicated that the 3D case. Herein, 4D polytopes
with 24 and 120 vertices are presented.

Fig. 3. Insphere and circumsphere for C ¼ 3 and C ¼ 6 load combina- Fig. 5. Selected polyhedra a) Regular Icosahedron (12 vertices) b) Rhombicu-
tions (M ¼ 2). boctahedron (24 vertices).

4
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

a) 24 Vertices - Octaplex

An octaplex (also known as the 24-cell) contains 24 vertices that are

generated from all permutations of (1, 1, 0, 0) in 4-space (Coxeter,
pffiffiffi
1973). The ratio of circumradius to inradius is 2.

b) 120 Vertices - Hexacosichoron

The hexacosichoron (also known as the 600-cell) contains 120

vertices. The coordinates of the vertices (normalized to have an inradius
of unity) are the even permutations of (0.87, 0.54, 0.33, 0), as well
as the permutations of (1.08, 0, 0, 0) and (0.54, 0.54, 0.54, 0.54)
(Coxeter, 1969). The ratio of the circumradius to inradius is approxi-
mately 1.08. A five-fold increase in the number of vertices decreases
conservatism by 33%.

2.4.4. General case

The special shapes presented in the preceding sections are applicable
when M  4. It is therefore necessary to determine a general polytope
that could be applied to an M-dimensional problem.
There are only three regular polytopes that exist in any dimension:
the simplex, the orthoplex, and the hypercube. In all dimensions, the
orthoplex is a more efficient shape than the hypercube, since it maintains
the same circumradius to inradius ratio, yet the orthoplex contains 2M
vertices, while the hypercube has M2 vertices. The simplex contains the
fewest vertices (at only Mþ1); however, the results produced by the
simplex are expected to be too conservative. Therefore, it will not be
considered further herein. The focus in this study will be the orthoplex.
The vertices of the orthoplex can be defined by unit vectors along Fig. 7. Regular and truncated polytope properties in M-dimensions a)
each of the Cartesian coordinate directions; that is, all permutations of circumradius-inradius ratio, b) number of vertices.
(1, 0, …,0). The equations of the various faces (hyperplanes) are
defined by: x1  x2 …  xM ¼ 1. The circumradius of this polytope is 1, the truncated orthoplex for various dimensions, M. The level of conser-
pffiffiffiffiffi
and the inradius is rin ¼ 1= M . To reduce the conservatism of the vatism increases with M; similarly, the number of vertices increases
orthoplex, it may be truncated, whereby the vertices are "chopped off" as rapidly. The conservatism of the truncated orthoplex increases more
demonstrated in Fig. 6(a) and Fig. 6(b) for the octahedron and truncated slowly with M than the case of the orthoplex, however the number of
octahedron (3D cases). The vertices are truncated until the length along vertices increases much more rapidly. For large M, many load combi-
each coordinate direction is equal to rin, which ensures the truncation nations will be necessary, and the load combinations will be quite con-
procedure has not reduced the inradius, while the circumradius is servative. Therefore, any reductions to the dimensionality of the problem
minimized. A new face is created with a hyperplane defined by xj ¼  rin . through PCA will significantly reduce the number of load combinations
The vertices of the truncated orthoplex are the points of intersection of required as well as the level of conservatism.
the new and original hyperplanes, which reveals the vertices are given by There are an unlimited number of polytopes of various dimensions
   
that could be employed to bound the M-sphere. Herein, several polytopes
the permutations of  p1ffiffiffi M
ffi;  1  p1ffiffiffiffi ; 0; …; 0 . The orthoplex is
M have been presented that could be employed; however, further research
pffiffiffiffiffi may reveal more efficient polytopes.
rescaled to have an inradius of unity: ð1; ð M  1Þ; 0; …; 0Þ. The
circumradius of the truncated orthoplex is:
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
rout pffiffiffiffiffi 2.5. Summary of design process
¼ Mþ22 M (12)
rin
The methodology presented in the preceding section presents a
The number of vertices of the truncated orthoplex is 4M(M-1). Fig. 7 framework to develop design load cases for DVAs under wind loads
plots the ratio rout/rin - 1 and the number of vertices for the orthoplex and acting on the structure. The following steps outline the proposed
methodology:

1. Wind tunnel test of the proposed structure using appropriate meth-

odologies (Xie and Garber, 2008)
2. Time domain simulations of the coupled structural-DVA system using
measured forces from the wind tunnel test
3. Extract time series of DVA loads from the simulations
4. Perform Principal Component Analysis and reduce degrees of
freedom where possible (Section 2.2)
5. Determine the centre and radius of the PC degrees of freedom
defining the hypersphere (Eqs. (5) and (6))
6. Choose a suitable polytope to bound the hypersphere balancing
conservatism and the number of load cases to consider (Section 2.4)
7. Transform polytope vertices into original load components (Eqs. (10)
Fig. 6. a) Octahedron, b) truncated octahedron. and (4))

5
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor
It is recommended to carry out the above sequence during the design
process of both the proposed structure and its potential DVA(s). The
following section provides three case studies demonstrating the appli-
cation of the proposed methodology. These examples include response
data simulated based on wind tunnel test results (as described in Step 1),
and the methodology is further validated using monitoring data from full
scale structures equipped with DVAs.
3. Application
The previous section has outlined a methodology to develop load
combinations for DVA loads applied to a primary structure. In this sec-
tion, the methodology will be applied to three case studies: 1) a structure
equipped with two dissimilarly-tuned unidirectional TSDs, 2) a structure
equipped with two bidirectional TMDs, and 3) a structure equipped with
three dissimilarly-tuned unidirectional TSDs. For Building 1, loading
time series of the design level DVA loads are determined using wind
tunnel testing and dynamic simulations. For Buildings 2 and 3, the time
series of monitoring data obtained from these structure-DVA systems
during significant wind events is used to generate load combinations. The
load combinations generated from the monitoring data are for specific
wind events, and do not represent the design level loads. However, the
data is used to demonstrate how the methodology can be employed to
generate load combinations from the results of time domain simulations
of design level wind events; the origin of the demonstrative data is not
relevant.
3.1. Building #1
Time series of wind loads on a structure may be determined using the
high-frequency force-balance (HFFB) wind tunnel testing technique, as
outlined in Xie and Garber (2008). An anonymous tall building is tested
and it is determined that two uni-directional TSD tanks with dissimilar
liquid depths will reduce building accelerations in the X-sway direction
to acceptable levels. The length, L, width, b, and liquid depth, h for the
Fig. 8. Segment of simulated TSD base shear forces during a design wind event (Building #1).
6
Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977
tanks are 15.24 m  6.71 m x 1.83m, and 15.24 m  6.71 m x 2.15m,
respectively. To maximize TSD efficiency, the natural frequencies of the
tanks are dissimilar, which will ensure that the response of each tank is
slightly different. Time series of the generalized forces determined using
the HFFB technique are applied to the simulated structure-TSD system.
Nonlinear time domain simulations are then conducted using a 3rd order
multimodal sloshing model coupled to a linear structure as described in
Love and Tait (2010). At each time step, the TSD is subjected to a base
acceleration (the acceleration of the building), and the response of the
three sloshing modes are determined. The TSD base shear forces are then
computed from the sloshing mode responses and applied to the building
at the subsequent time step, as described in Love and Tait (2010)). TSD
base shear forces are extracted from TSD base shear responses are
computed for the 50-year design event for winds from an azimuthal di-
rection of 10 . A segment of the TSD base shear forces simulated from the
wind tunnel loading data are shown in Fig. 8.
Principal component analysis is conducted for the four TSD base shear
time series. A segment of the resulting PCs is plotted in Fig. 9. The first PC
captures 78.9% of the response variance, the first two PCs capture 91.7%
of the response variance, and the first three PCs capture 99.4% of the
response variance. Therefore, only three PCs will be considered. Fig. 10
shows that the simulated TSD base shears and those recalculated using
three PCs are in excellent agreement.
It is next necessary to determine the expected maximum and mini-
mum values of the PCs. While several techniques are available to deter-
mine peaks (Peng et al., 2014), for this study, the maximum and
minimum observed values will be used. While the observed maxima and
minima are not statistically robust, they are used for simplicity in this
demonstration. Using the observed values, the centre responses of the
PCs are effectively zero, while the radii are approximately 286 kN,
112 kN, and 90 kN, respectively.
To demonstrate the effect of choosing a larger number of load com-
binations, 12 load combinations (C ¼ 12), and 24 load combinations
(C ¼ 24) will be determined. Fig. 11 plots the two load combinations
along with the PCs. Nearly all PCs are contained within the bounds of the
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

Fig. 9. PCs of TSD base shears (Building #1).

Fig. 10. TSD base shears as simulated and recalculated using three PCs (Building #1).

load combination sets, although there are a few regions in which the PC
time series exceed the bounds briefly. The exceedances correspond to a
few TSD sloshing cycles in which the three uncorrelated PCs experience
large cycles simultaneously. This behaviour is due to the random nature
of the three responses. The resulting load combinations are converted
into the original loading coordinates and summarized in Table 1.
3.2. Building #2
The second case considered is an anonymous tall building equipped
with two bidirectional TMDs with velocity-squared damping. The motion
of the building and two TMDs has been monitored during several sig-
nificant wind events. Details concerning of the dynamic properties of the

7
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

Fig. 11. Load cases enveloping PCs (Building #1). Spheres are the vertices of the scaled regular icosahedron and cubes are the vertices of the scaled
rhombicuboctahedron.

structure and TMDs are described elsewhere (Love et al., 2018). The
TMDs are located on opposite sides of the building, but are otherwise
intended to be identical. Since the building motion is dominated by the
two sway modes (rather than torsion), it is expected that the responses of
the two TMDs will be nearly identical.
The load applied by each TMD to the structure is directly proportional
to the absolute acceleration of the TMDs in the X- and Y-directions (Eqs.
(1) and (2)). The z-direction (vertical) acceleration is trivial in compar-
ison to the gravitational acceleration, and is therefore not considered
herein. Fig. 12 displays the acceleration of each TMD measured in the X-
and Y-directions during a wind event in February 2017. The acceleration
is presented in units of "milli-g", where 1 milli-g is 0.001 of gravitational
acceleration.
Principal component analysis is conducted on the four measured TMD
accelerations. The first PC captures 91% of the system response variance,
and the first two PCs capture 99.8% of the system response variance.
Therefore, only two PCs are deemed necessary to represent the system
response, which is demonstrated in Fig. 13 where the measure TMD
accelerations and those recalculated using only two PCs are in excellent
agreement. This reduced number of PCs is a result of the two TMD re-
sponses being nearly identical, which indicates that one of the TMD re-
sponses measured is effectively redundant. The reduction of the
dimensions of the load combinations from four to two will drastically
reduce the level of conservatism in the load combinations and the
number of required load combinations. The centre responses of the PCs
are approximately zero, while the radii are 0.305 milli-g and 0.129 milli-
g, respectively.
Load combinations are generated using three load combinations
(C ¼ 3), and ten load combinations (C ¼ 10). Fig. 14 plots the two load
combinations along with the PC time series. Nearly all PCs are contained
within the bounds of the load combination sets, although there are a few
regions in which the PC time series exceed the bounds briefly due to the
random nature of the uncorrelated time series. The resulting load com-
binations for C ¼ 3 and C ¼ 10 are converted into the original loading
coordinates and summarized in Table 2. These load combinations are
presented in the unit of milli-g, and must be multiplied by the TMD
masses (not disclosed herein to maintain anonymity) to produce DVA
loads in units of force. Employing a greater number of load combinations
decreases the amplitude of the load combinations considerably. For
example, Table 2 shows that when C ¼ 3, the maximum acceleration in
the Y-direction is 45 milli-g, however when C ¼ 10, the maximum ac-
celeration is only 23.7 milli-g. This substantial reduction occurs because
the greater number of load combinations more closely fits the envelope of
the loading vector time series.
3.3. Building #3
The third anonymous tall building is located in Toronto, Canada, and
is equipped with three unidirectional TSD tanks to reduce the X-sway
motion of the structure. The tank length, L width, b and water depth, h for
tanks 1, 2, and 3 are 11.2m  2.92m x 1.50m; 11.2m  2.8m x 1.67m;
and 11.2m  2.8m x 1.90m, respectively. Additional details of the
structure and TSD system are provided elsewhere (Love and Morava,
2018).
The structure is equipped with accelerometers on the TSD level to
measure the building sway, and ultrasonic wave probes near the west end
wall of each tank to measure wave heights. The tank base shears are
determined using Eqs. (1) and (2), where the accelerations of the liquid
centre of mass for each tank are given by (Faltinsen and Timokha, 2009)
2L €
€ þ
€xi ðtÞ ¼ XðtÞ βðtÞ (13)
π2 h
€
€yi ðtÞ ¼ YðtÞ (14)
where mxi ¼ myi ¼ mw is the mass of the water, XðtÞ € €
and YðtÞ are the
structural accelerations in the X- and Y-directions, respectively, and €βðtÞ
is the second time derivative of the wave height at the tank end wall.

8
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

Table 1 Equation (13) has been employed with the assumption that the funda-
TMD load combinations for C ¼ 12 and C ¼ 24 (Building #1). mental sloshing mode governs the sloshing response, which is valid
Fx (N) Fy (N) during common wind events such as the wind event considered herein.
Since these tanks are unidirectional, sloshing in the Y-direction is
Tank 1 Tank 2 Tank 1 Tank 2
negligible, therefore Eq. (14) only considers the building acceleration.
C ¼ 12 220132 205047 46552 53449 Fig. 15 shows a 5-hour record of the building accelerations and TSD
151455 275618 2078 1830
50816 179835 77860 89299
wave heights that were recorded on March 21, 2017, which was a windy
175926 112644 48678 56131 day in Toronto. The peak building accelerations during this wind event
17800 34912 75352 87009 are approximately 3 milli-g and 2 milli-g in the X- and Y-directions,
98034 71850 1980 1874 respectively, while the peak wave heights were 0.15m, 0.11m, and
223044 209635 47424 54446
0.14m in tanks 1, 2, and 3, respectively. The base shear forces for each
148543 271029 1205 833
53728 184423 78732 90295 tank are shown in Fig. 16, where is it clear that the loads in the X-di-
178837 117232 47806 55134 rection are greater than the loads in the Y-direction.
20712 30324 76225 88006 Principal component analysis is conducted on the three tank shear
95122 76438 2852 2871 forces in the X- and Y-directions. If only the first PC is considered, 47% of
C ¼ 24 102150 57818 67863 78248 the total response variance is represented. The total signal variance
4893 156476 59 425 accounted for increases to 85%, 99.6%, and 100.0% if (respectively) two,
150039 32099 19427 22581
three, and four PCs are included. Through Eq. (14), the forces in the Y-
42996 130757 48376 56092
36935 104900 82253 94568 direction are correlated, since all tanks share the same base acceleration
7403 145766 54168 61980 in the Y-direction. Therefore, two of the time series are redundant, and at
152549 42809 34681 39824 most four PCs can represent all forces. However, the loads are dominated
108211 83675 62766 72411 by base shear forces in the X-direction, which are an order of magnitude
40084 126169 49248 57088
147127 27510 18555 21585
greater than those in the Y-direction. The eigenvalues demonstrate this
7805 151888 813 1422 since 99.6% of the total signal variance is accommodated by the first
99238 53229 66990 77251 three PCs. Since base shear forces in the Y-direction are desired, four PCs
105299 79086 63638 73408 will be included when generating loads. Fig. 17 shows that the base shear
149637 38221 35553 40821
forces recalculated from four PCs are in excellent agreement with those
10315 141178 53295 60983
34023 100312 81380 93571 obtained from the measurements. The mean of each PC is approximately
171372 216812 61166 70168 zero, while the radii are 16000 N, 11800 N, 5400 N, and 1800 N,
127034 257678 33081 37580 respectively.
219261 191093 12730 14501 The load cases are generated using a 4D orthoplex, with 8 load cases,
174923 231959 15355 18087
172011 227370 16227 19083
and a 4D truncated orthoplex, which produces 24 load cases. Although
216349 186505 11858 13504 the load cases cannot be depicted visually, the resulting loads cases are
124122 253090 32208 36583 summarized in Table 3. Inspection of the load cases reveals that, as ex-
168460 212224 60293 69171 pected, the fewer load combinations presented by the orthoplex (C ¼ 8)
has resulted in loads that are much greater than the truncated orthoplex
(C ¼ 24).

Fig. 12. TMD acceleration during February 2017 wind event (Building #2).

9
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

Fig. 13. TMD acceleration as measured and recalculated using two PCs (Building #2).

Table 2
TMD load combinations for C ¼ 3 and C ¼ 10 (Building #2).
X-accel (milli-g) Y-accel (milli-g)

TMD 1 TMD 2 TMD 1 TMD 2

C¼3 16.1 20.1 19.9 20.8

12.8 14.9 22.5 23.7
2.6 4.4 42.8 45.0

C ¼ 10 4.1 4.5 18.8 19.8

8.1 9.6 7.8 8.3
9.0 11.1 6.0 6.3
6.6 8.5 17.5 18.4
1.7 2.7 22.3 23.4
3.7 4.0 18.5 19.4
7.6 9.1 7.6 8.0
8.6 10.6 6.3 6.6
6.1 8.0 17.8 18.7
1.3 2.2 22.6 23.7

the method proposed herein to generate appropriate load combinations.

Since the duration of seismic events is much shorter than that of wind
Fig. 14. Load cases enveloping PCs (Building #2).
events, future work should investigate how effectively PCA can discover
and decouple the important structure from such transient response data.
3.4. Method extensions

4. Conclusions
In the previous sections, the proposed method was applied to wind
tunnel test data, and structural monitoring data for buildings equipped
DVAs installed in structures to reduce motions produce continually-
with multiple DVAs. The data selected for analysis is approximately
varying loads that the structure must resist. Since it is impractical to
stationary, as the wind speed and direction does not change appreciably
check the structural system against all loading cases to which it might be
over the selected time frame. Of course, when the design loads are being
subjected during its lifetime, it is necessary to reduce the number of
predicted from wind tunnel tests and simulations, multiple wind di-
loading scenarios to only a few governing load combinations. In this
rections must be considered. The appropriate design wind speeds and
paper, a methodology is presented that employs principal component
directions will typically be determined based upon the meteorological
analysis (PCA) and higher dimensional geometry to generate load com-
climate of the area, and the susceptibility of building motion to various
binations for the DVA loads. The load combinations are generated by
wind directions. These topics are beyond the current scope of work.
prescribing an M-dimensional polytope that envelops an M-sphere. The
In many regions, significant DVA loads may be produced because of
vertices of the enveloping polytope represent the load combinations
the ground motions produced by strong seismic events. The DVA loads
when converted from the PC coordinates back into the original loading
generated from a suite of seismic simulations may also be assessed using
coordinates. The major findings of the study are:

10
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

Fig. 15. Measured building accelerations and TSD wave heights (Building #3).

Fig. 16. TSD tank base shear forces (Building #3).

 PCA enables redundant (correlated) loading time series to be identi-
fied, which can reduce the dimensionality of the M-sphere that is the
basis for generating load combinations. The reduction of the dimen-
sionality of the M-sphere simplifies the problem and generally re-
duces the number of load combinations that will be necessary.
 For the structure-DVA systems considered in this study, PCA reduced
the dimensionality of the problem from 4 to 3, 4 to 2, and from 6 to 4,
respectively.
 The ratio of the enveloping polytope’s circumradius to inradius rep-
resents a measure of the conservativism of the resulting load
combinations.

11
J.S. Love, Z.J. Taylor Journal of Wind Engineering & Industrial Aerodynamics 194 (2019) 103977

Fig. 17. Tank base shear forces as measured and recalculated using four PCs (Building #3).

will have a smaller circumradius-inradius ratio. Future research may

Table 3
discover an "optimal" polytope, which minimizes the circumradius to
TSD load combinations for C ¼ 8 and C ¼ 24 (Building #3).
inradius ratio for a given number of vertices and a given
Fx (N) Fy (N) dimensionality.
Tank 1 Tank 2 Tank 3 Tank 1 Tank 2 Tank 3  If efficient polytopes are selected, increasing the number of load
C¼8 29230 7437 10624 4 3 4 combinations can reduce the conservatism of the load combinations.
9637 13981 16613 7 5 6
349 8384 6718 16 12 13 To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time a methodology has
13 65 84 2377 1799 2003 been presented for the generation of load combinations for application to
4 55 86 2328 1763 1962
DVA loads. It is expected that the methodology may be generalized to be
366 8264 6888 33 25 28
9620 13862 16443 42 31 35 used for other applications in wind engineering (or other fields) requiring
29213 7556 10793 44 33 37 load combinations to be generated from time series of loading vectors,
C ¼ 24 13744 2331 2142 11 8 9 including tower overall base shears and overturning moments.
10213 352 6106 14 11 12
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