AN EXPERIMENTAL STUDY ON EVALUATION OF SHEAR PROPERTIES OF RUBBER BEARINGS WITH AXIAL STRESS PARAMETERS

Abstract

 Couple of rubber bearings on highway bridges were damaged by 2011 Tohoku Pacific Offshore Earthquake and 2016 Kumamoto Earthquake. Even though the seismic design method using the rubber bearings has been widely used since 1995 Kobe Earthquake, the vertical and shear properties of the rubber bearing has not been identified due to lack of related experimental studies. In this study, in order to investigate the shear behavior and shear properties of Rubber Bearings (RB) subjected to tensile force, cyclic loading tests using 4 test specimens of RB were conducted. To evaluate the shear properties of RB, here in, the tests varied with axial stress were carried out. Furthermore, to evaluate the influence of the primary shape factor (S₁) which was defined in the design code of bearing support on the shear properties of RB, the cyclic loading tests using a different specimen of S₁.