Semi-active tuned mass damper design for balcony vibration control

We investigate the use of a semi-active tuned mass damper (TMD) to reduce vibrations, induced by a choir´s performance, of a church balcony. Both semi-active and passive designs are modeled and parameter analyses are conducted to find optimal hardware configurations for each configuration. We simulate the nonlinear governing equations of motion to evaluate the performance of the semi-active system. The optimal semi-active TMD, which utilized Lyapunov based control, outperformed the optimal passive design by providing 10% more reduction of RMS displacement and 7% more reduction of RMS acceleration