Presentazione lavoro di ricerca presso Conferenza mondiale di Ingegneria Sismica (WCEE 2024): EARTHQUAKE-PROOF GLASS-ALUMINIUM PARTITION WALLS WITH VISCOELASTIC DISSIPATIVE DEVICES

Glass-aluminium partition walls are an aesthetically appealing solution for dividing open spaces within buildings. However, their seismic performance poses some serious concerns due to their limited capacity to withstand inter-storey drifts. To reduce their seismic vulnerability, the original idea proposed in this con-tribution is the decoupling of the glass plates, which represent the quasi-totality of the system mass, from the perimetral aluminium frames by exploiting a dissipative connection made of high damping rubber pads. The concept behind the proposed solution is presented in this paper and some experimental analyses per-formed on various small-scale and real-scale prototypes are presented. It is shown that the proposed inno-vative solution allows to avoid any damage in conditions that could be found in multistorey buildings in re-gions of high seismic risk in Italy. Finally, a first real application in a public building in the Marche region, close to the epicentres of the 2016 Central Italy seismic events, is presented showing advantages over tra-ditional solutions and highlighting possible further developments.