• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.299-314
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• 2003

This investigation presents an efficient method for identifying modal characteristics from the measured displacement, velocity and acceleration signals of multiple channels on structural systems. A Vector Backward Auto-Regressive model (VBAR) that describes the relationship between the output information in different time steps is used to establish a backward state equation. Generally, the accuracy of the identified dynamic characteristics can be improved by increasing the order of the Auto-Regressive model (AR) in cases of measurement of data under noisy circumstances. However, a higher-order AR model also induces more numerical modes, only some of which are the system modes. The proposed VBAR model provides a clear characteristic boundary to separate the system modes from the spurious modes. A numerical example of a lumped-mass model with three DOFs was established to verify the applicability and effectiveness of the proposed method. Finally, an offshore platform model was experimentally employed as an application case to confirm the proposed VBAR method can be applied to real-world structures.