Hysteretic device for seismic protection of RC precast structures

In the last decades, earthquakes all over Europe have demonstrated that structural and nonstructural joints provide the most significant source of seismic vulnerability for RC precast structures. For this reason, many retrofitting techniques have been developed for existing buildings, aiming at the connection strengthening. In this paper, a novel hysteretic device is presented at this purpose and applied to a typical exiting single-story RC precast building, characterized by pure frictional beam-to-column joints. Dynamic analyses are performed on both the bare and the retrofitted structure. A parametric analysis is performed in order to optimize the seismic performance of both the device and the structure. Outcomes concerning the seismic response of the structure are reported in terms of dissipated energy.