• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.47 no.2
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• pp.239-251
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• 2023

The stiffness evaluation of cracked base metal is of great guidance to fatigue crack reinforcement. By carrying out fatigue tests and numerical simulation of typical cracking details in steel box girder, the strain-degradation law of cracked base metal was analyzed and the relationship between base metal stress and its displacement (stiffness) was explored. The feasibility of evaluating the stress of cracked base metal based on the stress field at the crack tip was verified. The results demonstrate that the stiffness of cracked base metal shows the fast-to-slow degradation trend with fatigue cracking and the base metal at 50mm or more behind the crack tip basically lose its bearing capacity. Drilling will further accelerate stiffness degradation with the increase of hole diameters. The base metal stress has a negative linear relation with its displacement (stiffness), The stress of cracked base metal is also related to stress intensity factor and its relative position (distance, included angle) to the crack tip, through which the local stiffness can be effectively evaluated. Since the stiffness is not uniformly distributed along the cracked base metal, the reinforcement patch is suggested to be designed according to the stiffness to avoid excessive reinforcement for the areas incompletely unloaded.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.175-183
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• 2022

To study the working mechanism and size effect of an innovative dovetail UHPC joint originated from the 5th Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge, a large-scale testing subject to negative bending moment was conducted and compared with the previous scaled specimens. The static responses, i.e., the crack pattern, failure mode, ductility and stiffness degradation were analyzed. It was found that the scaled specimens presented similar working stages and working mechanism with the large-scale ones. However, the post-cracking ductility and relative stiffness degradation all decrease with the enlarged length/scale, apart from the relative stiffness after flexural cracking. The slab stiffness at the flexural cracking stage is 90% of the initial stiffness while only 24% of the initial stiffness reserved in the ultimate stage. Finite element model (FEM) was established and compared with the experiments to verify its effectiveness in exploring the working mechanism of the innovative joint. Based on this effective method, a series of FEMs were established to further study the influence of material strength, pre-stressing level and ratio of reinforcement on its deflection-load relationship. It is found that the ratio of reinforcement can significantly improve its load-carrying capacity among the three major-influenced factors.

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 1998.04a
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• pp.141-148
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• 1998

The chloride attack of the top mat of reinforcing bars is a major cause of deterioration of comcrete deck of plate girder bridges. This is caused by a current design method which requires a top mat of reinforcing bars to resist a negative bending moment in bridge decks. In recently, empirical evidence has indicated that the top transverse reinforcing bars can patially or fully be eliminated without jeopardizing the structural integrity of a deck. So, one of the most efficient way to increase durability of concrete deck of bridges is the development of new design method that reduce or eliminate the top mat reinforcing bars, mad it is possible by the exact analysis that considering the negative bending moment reducing effect which introduced by relative deflection of plate girders. In this study, we develop the new bridge deck analysis method that considered the effect of relative girder deflection by applying the principles of slope deflection method of frames, and that is fine tuned with results of finite element analysis. This new approach evaluate a bending moment in a deck based on the effect of relative girder deflection as well as the magnitude of wheel loads, the girder spacing and stiffness, deck stiffness and the span length

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.2 no.2 s.3
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• pp.32-38
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• 1999

An experimental study is performed to investigate the frequency effects of the excitation force on the linear stiffness and damping coefficients of a LOP (load on pad) type five-pad tilting pad journal bearing with the diameter of 300.91 mm and the length of 149.80 mm. The main parameter of interest in the present work is excitation frequency to shake the test bearing. The excitation frequency is controlled independently, using orthogonally mounted hydraulic exciters. The relative movement between the bearing and shaft, and the acceleration of the bearing casing are measured as a function of excitation frequency using the different values of bearing load and shaft speed. Measurements show that the variation of excitation frequency has quite a little effect on both stiffness and damping coefficients. Both direct stiffness and damping coefficients in the direction of bearing load decrease by the increase of shaft speed, but increase with the bearing load.

• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 1998.12a
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• pp.173-179
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• 1998

An experimental study is performed to investigate the frequency effects of the excitation force on the linear stiffness and damping coefficients of a LOP (load on pad) type five-pad tilting pad journal bearing with the diameter of 300.91 mm and the length of 149.80 mm. The main parameter of interest in the present work is excitation frequency to shake the test bearing. The excitation frequency is controlled independently, using orthogonally mounted hydraulic exciters. The relative movement between the bearing and shaft, and the acceleration of the bearing casing are measured as a function of excitation frequency using the different values of bearing load and shaft speed. Measurements show that the variation of excitation frequency has quite a little effect on both stiffness and damping coefficients. Both direct stiffness and damping coefficients in the direction of bearing load decrease by the increase of shaft speed, but increase with the bearing load.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.586-594
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• 1999

To limit both the large displacement and acceleration response of the structure efficiently, the relationships between acceleration and displacement responses of the structure under several earthquakes are investigated for various horizontal stiffness of the base isolation system to determine the effective stiffness of the base isolation system in this paper. An example structure is a five-storey steel frame building as the primary structure and the secondary structures are assumed to be located on the fifth floor of the primary structure. Input motions used in the structural analysis are El Centre 1940, Taft 1952, Mexico 1985, San Fernando 1971 Pacoima Dam, and artificially generated earthquakes. The relationships of the absolute peak acceleration and the displacement at the top of the structure are calculated for various natural periods of base isolators under various earthquakes. The peak acceleration response of the fifth floor in the base isolated structure is significantly reduced by a factor of 2.1 through 6.25. Also, the relative displacement response of the floor to the base of the superstructure is very small. The results of this study can be utilized to determine the effective stiffness of the base isolation system.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.14-22
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• 1998

This paper describes the effects of exciting frequency on the stiffness and damping coefticients of a 5-pad tilting pad journal bearing, LOP (load on pad) type. The stiffness and damping coefficients are investigated experimentally under the different values of exciting frequency, bearing load and shaft speed. These coefficients are estimated by measuring the response of the relative displacement between the bearing and the shaft and acceleration of the bearing due to the known exciting loads acting on the bearing. In order to analysis the response of exciting load, displacement and acceleration, a FFT analyzer is used. It is shown that the variation of exciting frequency has a little effect on both the stiffness and damping coefficients. Both the stiffness and damping coefficients in the loading direction are decreased by the increase of shaft speed but increased by the increase of bearing load.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.141-149
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• 2003

This paper proposes a method of measuring and imaging the stiffness of human soft tissue to diagnose cancers or tumors which have been difficult to detect in ultrasound B-mode imaging systems. To measure the soft tissue stiffness, sinusoidal vibrations are applied to it, and the magnitude of its mechanical vibration is determined by estimating the temporal variation of speckle pattern brightness in ultrasound B-mode images. It is verified by simulation and experiment that the proposed method can estimate the relative tissue stiffness from B-mode images with a relatively small amount of computation.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.37 no.10
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• pp.1195-1200
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• 2013

In recent years, variable stiffness actuation has attracted much attention because interaction between a robot and the environment is increasingly required for various robot tasks. Several variable stiffness actuators (VSAs) have been developed; however, they find limited applications owing to their size and weight. For realizing their widespread use, we developed a compact and lightweight mini-VSA. The mini-VSA consists of a control module based on an adjustable moment arm mechanism and a drive module with two motors. By controlling the relative motion of cams in the control module, the position and stiffness can be simultaneously controlled. Experimental results are presented to show its ability to change stiffness.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.39 no.4
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• pp.419-433
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• 2021

In composite structures, shear connectors are crucial components to resist the relative slip between the steel and concrete, and thereby to achieve the composite actions. In the service stage, composite structures are usually in elastic state, so the elastic stiffness of the shear connection is a quite important parameter in the structural analysis of composite structures. Nevertheless, the existing studies mainly focus on the load-slip relationship rather than the tangent stiffness at the initial elastic stage. Furthermore, when composite beams subjected to torque or local load, shear connections are affected by both tensile force and shear force. However, the stiffness of shear connections under combined effects appears not to have been discussed hitherto. This paper investigates the initial elastic stiffness of stud connections under combined effects of biaxial forces. The initial expression and the relevant parameters are obtained by establishing a simplified analytical model of the stud connection. Afterwards, parametric finite element analysis is performed to investigate the effects of the relevant factors, including the stud length, stud diameter, elastic modulus of concrete, elastic modulus of steel and volume ratio of reinforcement. The feasibility of the proposed modelling has been proved by comparing with sufficient experimental tests. Based on the analytical analysis and the extensive numerical simulations, design equations for predicting the initial elastic stiffness of stud connections are proposed. The comparison between the equations and the data of finite element models demonstrates that the equations are accurate enough to serve for engineering communities.