• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.177-195
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• 2016

To secure the stability of geotechnical infrastructures and minimize failures during the construction process, a number of support systems have been introduced in the last several decades. In particular, stabilization methods using steel bars have been widely used in the field of geotechnical engineering. Rock bolt system is representative support system using steel bars. Pre-stressing has been applied to enhance reinforcement performance but can be released because of the failure of head or anchor sections. To overcome this deficiency, this paper proposes an innovative support system that can actively reinforce the weak ground along the whole structural element by introducing an active tension bolt containing a spring unit to the middle of the steel bar to increase its reinforcement capacity. In addition, the paper presents the support mechanism of the active tension bolt based on a theoretical study and employs an experimental study to validate the performance of the proposed active tension bolt based on a down-scaled model. To examine the feasibility of the active tension unit in a pillar, the paper considers a pullout test and a small-scale experimental model. The experimental results suggest the active tension bolt to be an effective support system for pillar reinforcement.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.135-147
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• 2016

This paper describes a smart structural system, which uses smart materials for real-time monitoring and active control of bolted-joints in steel structures. The goal of this research is to reduce the possibility of failure and the cost of maintenance of steel structures such as bridges, electricity pylons, steel lattice towers and so on. The concept of the smart structural system combines impedance based health monitoring techniques with a shape memory alloy (SMA) washer to restore the tension of the loosened bolt. The impedance-based structural health monitoring (SHM) techniques were used to detect loosened bolts in bolted-joints. By comparing electrical impedance signatures measured from a potentially damage structure with baseline data obtained from the pristine structure, the bolt loosening damage could be detected. An outlier analysis, using generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution, providing optimal decision boundaries, has been carried out for more systematic damage detection. Once the loosening damage was detected in the bolted joint, the external heater, which was bonded to the SMA washer, actuated the washer. Then, the heated SMA washer expanded axially and adjusted the bolt tension to restore the lost torque. Additionally, temperature variation due to the heater was compensated by applying the effective frequency shift (EFS) algorithm to improve the performance of the diagnostic results. An experimental study was conducted by integrating the piezoelectric material based structural health monitoring and the SMA-based active control function on a bolted joint, after which the performance of the smart 'self-monitoring and self-healing bolted joint system' was demonstrated.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.629-636
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• 2011

This paper describes the smart structural system that uses smart materials for real-time monitoring and active control of bolted joints in steel structures. The impedance-based structural health monitoring (SHM) techniques, which utilize the electro-mechanical coupling property of piezoelectric materials, was used to detect loose bolts in bolted joints. By monitoring the measured electrical impedance and comparing it with the measured baseline, a bolt loosening damage was detected. The damage was evaluated quantitatively using the damage metrics in conductance signature with respect to the healthy states. When loosening damage was detected in the bolted joint, the external heater actuated the shape memory alloy (SMA) washer. Then the heated SMA washer expanded axially and adjusted the bolt tension to restore the lost torque. An experiment was conducted by integrating the piezoelectric-material-based SHM function and the SMA-based active control function on a bolted joint, after which the performance of thesmart self-healing joint system was investigated.