Protecting Mexico City’s buildings

An increasing number of Mexico City’s tallest buildings are being protected against earthquakes by RESTON®SA shock absorbers – just one of mageba’s range of seismic protection devices.

Since establishing its Mexican subsidiary in 2013 – exactly 50 years after the company was founded in 1963 – mageba has already earned a strong reputation there as a reliable supplier of high-quality structural protection devices. This is illustrated by the number of impressive, successfully completed projects to date, in Mexico City alone, that involved the supply of RESTON®SA shock absorbers – including the Telmex Lerma Building, the Ministry of Economy’s Executive Tower, the Cibeles Tower and the Cuauhtemoc 947 Building.

The latest addition to the list is the Periferico 428 building, which is currently being constructed in the city. The building development includes two main towers with approximately 700 apartments as well as commercial areas and underground parking. To optimise the structural design while complying with the city’s seismic protection codes, RESTON®SA dampers were used. These were designed with an alpha value of 0.1 and a maximum displacement capacity of +/- 50 mm, and for forces of between 600 and 1400 kN. Following fabrication and testing in Shanghai, they have now been delivered to site – marked with the CE label, attesting to the quality of their design, fabrication and testing.

RESTON®SA is just one of mageba’s wide range of seismic protection devices, which also includes RESTON®STU shock transmission units, RESTON®PSD preloaded spring dampers, and a comprehensive selection of seismic isolators such as RESTON®PENDULUM curved surface slider bearings, LASTO®LRB lead rubber bearings and LASTO®HDRB high damping rubber bearings. Each of these has a role to play in protecting structures from earthquakes, depending on the structure’s design and circumstances, and selecting the optimal solution for any particular project requires a level of specialist knowledge that most engineers don’t possess. And that is what we are here for. As summarised by mageba’s mission statement: “We offer protection for structures, competent advice, expertise and service”. So contact us any time you have a project involving a building – or a bridge – that could benefit from the use of seismic protection devices. Whether in Mexico City or anywhere else around the world, we are there for you.

Building designer: WSP DE MEXICO
Contractor: Inmobiliaria IHM S.A. de C.V.
Owner: Inmobiliaria IHM S.A. de C.V.

mageba is supplying almost all of the bearings and joints needed for the first 80-kilometre phase of the new high-speed railway connection being built from Belgrade to Budapest

The towers are being fitted with RESTON®SA shock absorbers (here as designed for this project) to improve their ability to survive a major earthquake

Testing of the shock absorbers (dampers) as designed and fabricated for the project, at the Sismalab testing laboratory in Shanghai

The shock absorbers were fabricated in mageba’s Shanghai production facility before shipping to Mexico

Lifting of a RESTON®SA shock absorber into the basement level of one tower prior to installation in the structure

Final checking of damper by a mageba representative before insertion into the building’s steelwork structure

Installation of damper between the base of one of the steel structure’s columns and a diagonal bracing member

The Telmex Lerma Building in Mexico City, retrofitted with RESTON®SA shock absorbers in 2014

The RESTON®SA shock absorbers that were retrofitted to the Telmex Lerma Building in Mexico City can be seen through the windows

The Ministry of Economy’s Executive Tower in Mexico City, retrofitted with RESTON®SA shock absorbers in 2017

Two of the RESTON®SA shock absorbers as retrofitted in the Ministry of Economy’s Executive Tower

The Cibeles Tower in Mexico City, retrofitted with RESTON®SA shock absorbers in 2018

Testing of the shock absorbers (dampers) as designed and fabricated for the project, at the Sismalab testing laboratory in Shanghai

The Cuauhtemoc 947 Building in Mexico City, retrofitted with RESTON®SA shock absorbers in 2019