Abstract
Since the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, seismic isolation bearings for bridges have
become widely used, and there is no doubt that they have higher seismic performance than
conventional steel bearings. On the other hand, the fact that some seismic isolation bearings
ruptured or failed in recent earthquakes should be recognized as an inconvenient truth.
After the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, we regret our lack of understanding of the
seismic behavior of full-scale structures well, and the world’s largest three-dimensional shake
table, E-Defense, was installed. Recently, we recognized our lack of understanding of full-scale
seismic isolation bearings well, E-Isolation was developed as a large dynamic loading machine
with a high-precision load measurement mechanism. The accumulation of high-quality data on
full-scale seismic isolation bearings using E-Isolation has begun to restore their reliability.
