• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.393-402
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• 2017

Many vibration-based global damage detection methods attempt to extract modal parameters from vibration signals as the main structural features to detect damage. The local flexibility method is one promising method that requires only the first few fundamental modes to detect not only the location but also the extent of damage. Generally, the mode shapes in the lateral degree of freedom are extracted from lateral vibration signals and then used to detect damage for a beam structure. In this study, a new approach which employs the mode shapes in the rotary degree of freedom obtained from the macro-strain vibration signals to detect damage of a beam structure is proposed. In order to facilitate the application of mode shapes in the rotary degree of freedom for beam structures, the local flexibility method is modified and utilized. The proposed rotary approach is verified by numerical and experimental studies of simply supported beams. The results illustrate potential feasibility of the proposed new idea. Compared to the method that uses lateral measurements, the proposed rotary approach seems more robust to noise in the numerical cases considered. The sensor configuration could also be more flexible and customized for a beam structure. Primarily, the proposed approach seems more sensitive to damage when the damage is close to the supports of simply supported beams.

• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.399-418
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• 2015

Automated damage detection through Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) techniques has become an active area of research in the bridge engineering community but widespread implementation on in-service infrastructure still presents some challenges. In the meantime, visual inspection remains as the most common method for condition assessment even though collected information is highly subjective and certain types of damage can be overlooked by the inspector. In this article, a Frequency Response Functions-based model updating algorithm is evaluated using experimentally collected data from the University of Central Florida (UCF)-Benchmark Structure. A protocol for measurement selection and a regularization technique are presented in this work in order to provide the most well-conditioned model updating scenario for the target structure. The proposed technique is composed of two main stages. First, the initial finite element model (FEM) is calibrated through model updating so that it captures the dynamic signature of the UCF Benchmark Structure in its healthy condition. Second, based upon collected data from the damaged condition, the updating process is repeated on the baseline (healthy) FEM. The difference between the updated parameters from subsequent stages revealed both location and extent of damage in a "blind" scenario, without any previous information about type and location of damage.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.64 no.5
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• pp.653-660
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• 2017

The aim of this study is to accurately estimate seismic damage and the collapse mechanism of the historical stone masonry minaret "Hafsa Sultan", which was built in 1522. Surveying measurements and material tests were conducted to obtain a 3D solid model and the mechanical properties of the components of the minaret. The initial Finite Element (FE) model is analyzed and numerical dynamic characteristics of the minaret are obtained. The Operational Modal Analysis (OMA) method is conducted to obtain the experimental dynamic characteristics of the minaret and the initial FE model is calibrated by using the experimental results. Then, linear time history (LTH) and nonlinear time history (NLTH) analyses are carried out on the calibrated FE model by using two different ground motions. Iron clamps which used as connection element between the stones of the minaret considerably increase the tensile strength of the masonry system. The Concrete Damage Plasticity (CDP) model is selected in the nonlinear analyses in ABAQUS. The analyses conducted indicate that the results of the linear analyses are not as realistic as the nonlinear analysis results when compared with existing damage.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.303-316
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• 2024

Seismic records are composed of mainshock and a series of aftershocks which often result in the incremental damage to underground structures and bring great challenges to the rescue of post-disaster and the repair of post-earthquake. In this paper, the repetition method was used to construct the mainshock-aftershocks sequence which was used as the input ground motion for the analysis of dynamic time history. Based on the Daikai station, the two-dimensional finite element model of soil-station was established to explore the failure process of station under different seismic precautionary intensities, and the concept of incremental damage of station was introduced to quantitatively analyze the damage condition of structure under the action of mainshock and two aftershocks. An arc rubber bearing was proposed for the shock absorption. With the arc rubber bearing, the mode of the traditional column end connection was changed from "fixed connection" to "hinged joint", and the ductility of the structure was significantly improved. The results show that the damage condition of the subway station is closely related to the magnitude of the mainshock. When the magnitude of the mainshock is low, the incremental damage to the structure caused by the subsequent aftershocks is little. When the magnitude of the mainshock is high, the subsequent aftershocks will cause serious incremental damage to the structure, and may even lead to the collapse of the station. The arc rubber bearing can reduce the damage to the station. The results can offer a reference for the seismic design of subway stations under the action of mainshock-aftershocks.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.1-20
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• 2011

This study investigates the feasibility of detecting structural damage using the HHT method. A damage detection index, the ratio of bandwidth (RB) is proposed. This index is highly correlated or approximately equal to the change of equivalent damping ratio for an intact structure incurring damage from strong ground motions. Based on an analysis of shaking table test data from benchmark models subjected to adjusted Kobe and El Centro earthquakes, the damage detection index is evaluated using the Hilbert-Huang Transform (HHT) and the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) methods, respectively. Results indicate that, when the response of the structure is in the elastic region, the RB value only slightly changes in both the HHT and the FFT spectra. Additionally, RB values estimated from the HHT spectra vs. the PGA values change incrementally when the structure response is nonlinear i.e., member yielding occurs, but not in the RB curve from the FFT spectra. Moreover, the RB value of the top floor changes more than those from the other floors. Furthermore, structural damage is detected only when using the acceleration response data from the top floor. Therefore, the ratio of bandwidth RB estimated from the smoothed HHT spectra is an effective and sensitive damage index for detecting structural damage. Results of this study also demonstrate that the HHT is a powerful method in analyzing the nonlinear responses of steel structures to strong ground motions.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.1-13
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• 2015

This paper proposes an analytical mode decomposition (AMD) and Hilbert transform method for structural nonlinearity quantification and damage detection under earthquake loads. The measured structural response is first decomposed into several intrinsic mode functions (IMF) using the proposed AMD method. Each IMF is an amplitude modulated-frequency modulated signal with narrow frequency bandwidth. Then, the instantaneous frequencies of the decomposed IMF can be defined with Hilbert transform. However, for a nonlinear structure, the defined instantaneous frequencies from the decomposed IMF are not equal to the instantaneous frequencies of the structure itself. The theoretical derivation in this paper indicates that the instantaneous frequency of the decomposed measured response includes a slowly-varying part which represents the instantaneous frequency of the structure and rapidly-varying part for a nonlinear structure subjected to earthquake excitations. To eliminate the rapidly-varying part effects, the instantaneous frequency is integrated over time duration. Then the degree of nonlinearity index, which represents the damage severity of structure, is defined based on the integrated instantaneous frequency in this paper. A one-story hysteretic nonlinear structure with various earthquake excitations are simulated as numerical examples and the degree of nonlinearity index is obtained. Finally, the degree of nonlinearity index is estimated from the experimental data of a seven-story building under four earthquake excitations. The index values for the building subjected to a low intensity earthquake excitation, two medium intensity earthquake excitations, and a large intensity earthquake excitation are calculated as 12.8%, 23.0%, 23.2%, and 39.5%, respectively.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.325-337
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• 2009

Structural damage detection, damage localization and severity estimation of jacket platforms, based on calculating modal strain energy is presented in this paper. In the structure, damage often causes a loss of stiffness in some elements, so modal parameters; mode shapes and natural frequencies, in the damaged structure are different from the undamaged state. Geometrical location of damage is detected by computing modal strain energy change ratio (MSECR) for each structural element, which elements with higher MSECR are suspected to be damaged. For each suspected damaged element, by computing cross-modal strain energy (CMSE), damage severity as the stiffness reduction factor -that represented the ratios between the element stiffness changes to the undamaged element stiffness- is estimated. Numerical studies are demonstrated for a three dimensional, single bay, four stories frame of the existing jacket platform, based on the synthetic data that generated from finite element model. It is observed that this method can be used for damage detection of this kind of structures.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.4 no.5
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• pp.605-628
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• 2008

In bridge structures, damage may induce an additional deflection which may naturally contain essential information about the damage. However, inverse mapping from the damage-induced deflection to the actual damage location and severity is generally complex, particularly for statically indeterminate systems. In this paper, a new load concept, called the positive-bending-inspection-load (PBIL) is proposed to construct a simple inverse mapping from the damage-induced deflection to the actual damage location. A PBIL for an inspection region is defined as a load or a system of loads which guarantees the bending moment to be positive in the inspection region. From the theoretical investigations, it was proven that the damage-induced chord-wise deflection (DI-CD) has the maximum value with the abrupt change in its slope at the damage location under a PBIL. Hence, a novel damage localization method is proposed based on the DI-CD under a PBIL. The procedure may be summarized as: (1) identification of the modal flexibility matrices from acceleration measurements, (2) design for a PBIL for an inspection region of interest in a structure, (3) calculation of the chord-wise deflections for the PBIL using the modal flexibility matrices, and (4) damage localization by finding the location with the maximum DI-CD with the abrupt change in its slope within the inspection region. Procedures from (2)-(4) can be repeated for several inspection regions to cover the whole structure complementarily. Numerical verification studies were carried out on a simply supported beam and a three-span continuous beam model. Experimental verification study was also carried out on a two-span continuous beam structure with a steel box-girder. It was found that the proposed method can identify the damage existence and damage location for small damage cases with narrow cuts at the bottom flange.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.345-368
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• 2020

The present work proposes a self-controlled multi-stage optimization method for damage identification of structures utilizing standard particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm. Damage identification problem is formulated as an inverse optimization problem where damage severity in each element of the structure is considered as optimization variables. An efficient objective function is formed using the first few frequencies and mode shapes of the structure. This objective function is minimized by a self-controlled multi-stage strategy to identify and quantify the damage extent of the structural members. In the first stage, standard PSO is utilized to get an initial solution to the problem. Subsequently, the algorithm identifies the most damage-prone elements of the structure using an adaptable threshold value of damage severity. These identified elements are included in the search space of the standard PSO at the next stage. Thus, the algorithm reduces the dimension of the search space and subsequently increases the accuracy of damage prediction with a considerable reduction in computational cost. The efficiency of the proposed method is investigated and compared with available results through three numerical examples considering both with and without noise. The obtained results demonstrate the accuracy of the present method can accurately estimate the location and severity of multi-damage cases in the structural systems with less computational cost.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.29-46
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• 2005

In this study, a wavelet packet based method is proposed for identifying damage occurrence and damage location for beam-like structures. This method assumes that the displacement or the acceleration response time histories at various locations along a beam-like structure both before and after damage are available for damage assessment. These responses are processed through a proper level of wavelet packet decomposition. The wavelet packet signature (WPS) that consists of wavelet packet component signal energies is calculated. The change of the WPS curvature between the baseline state and the current state is then used to identify the locations of possible damage in the structure. Two numerical studies, one on a 15-storey shear-beam building frame and another on a simply-supported steel beam, and an experimental study on a simply-supported reinforced concrete beam are performed to validate the proposed method. Results show the WPS curvature change can be used to locate both single and sparsely-distributed multiple damages that exist in the structure. Also the accuracy of assessment does not seem to be affected by the presence of 20-15dB measurement noise. One advantage of the proposed method is that it does not require any mathematical model for the structure being monitored and hence can potentially be used for practical application.