The Dongting Lake Bridge is a cable-stayed bridge crossing the Dongting Lake where it meets the Yangtze River in southern central China. Several intensive wind-rain induced vibrations had been observed since its open to traffic in 1999. To investigate the possibility of using MR damping systems to reduce cable vibration, a series of field tests were conducted. Based on the promising research results, MR damping system was installed on the longest 156 stay cables of Dongting Lake Bridge in June 2002, making it the worlds first application of MR dampers on cable-stayed bridge to suppress the wind-rain induced cable vibration. As a visible and permanent aspect of the bridge, the MR damping system must be aesthetically pleasing, reliable, durable, easy to maintain, as well as effective in vibration mitigation. Substantial work was done to meet these requirements. This paper describes field tests and the implementation of MR damping systems for cable vibration reduction. Three-years reliable service of this system proves its durability.

In this study, a wind tunnel, that has been developed for experiments of wind turbine rotor blades, has been considered. The deviations of the measurements have been examined after this wind tunnel had been introduced and the measurements on it had been explained. Two different wind turbine rotor blades miniatures have been used for getting better results from the experiments. The accuracy of measurements have been experimented three times repetitively and examined statistically. As a result, wind speed values which this type of wind tunnel and wind turbine rotors need for starting, wind speed in the tunnel, temperature and moisture values, the number of rotor's revolution, and the voltage that is produced in 102 ${\Omega}$ resistance and current values have been determined to be fixed by measurements used. This type of wind tunnel and wind turbine rotor' performance difference and the difference of revolution figures have been determined to be fixed by measurements used.

Wind tunnel experiments were conducted under highly turbulent and disturbed flow conditions over a solid/perforated plate with a long splitter plate in its plane of symmetry. The effect of varied level of perforation of the normal plate on fluctuating velocities and fluctuating pressures measured across and along the separation bubble was studied. The different perforation levels of the normal plate; that is 0%, 10%, 20%, 30%, 40% and 50% are studied. The Reynolds number based on step height was varied from $4{\times}10^3$ to $1.2{\times}10^4$. The shape and size of the bubble vary with different perforation level of the normal plate that is to say the bubble is reduced both in height and length up to 30% perforation level. For higher perforation of the normal plate, bubble is completely swept out. The peak turbulence value occurs around 0.7 to 0.8 times the reattachment length. The turbulence intensity values are highest for the case of solid normal plate (bleed air is absent) and are lowest for the case of 50% perforation of the normal plate (bleed air is maximum in the present study). From the analysis of data it is observed that $\sqrt{\overline{u^{{\prime}2}}}/(\sqrt{\overline{u^{{\prime}2}}})_{max}$, (the ratio of RMS velocity fluctuation to maximum RMS velocity fluctuation), is uniquely related with dimensionless distance y/Y', (the ratio of distance normal to splitter plate to the distance where RMS velocity fluctuation is half its maximum value) for all the perforated normal plates. It is interesting to note that for 50% perforation of the normal plate, the RMS pressure fluctuation in the flow field gets reduced to around 60% as compared to that for solid normal plate. Analysis of the results show that the ratio [$C^{\prime}_p$ max/$-C_{pb}(1-{\eta})$], where $C^{\prime}_p$ max is the maximum coefficient of fluctuating pressure, $C_{pb}$ is the coefficient of base pressure and ${\eta}$ is the perforation level (ratio of open to total area), for surface RMS pressure fluctuation levels seems to be constant and has value of about 0.22. Similar analysis show that the ratio $[C^{\prime}_p$ max/$-C_{pb}(1-{\eta})]$ for flow field RMS pressure fluctuation levels seems to be constant and has a value of about 0.32.

This paper illustrates application of the proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) and the autoregressive (AR) model to simulate large wind pressures due to gusts on a low-rise building. In the POD analysis, the covariance of the ensemble of large wind pressures is employed to calculate the principal modes and coordinates. The POD principal coordinates are modeled using the AR process, and the fitted AR models are employed to generate the principal coordinates. The generated principal coordinates are then used to simulate large wind pressures. The results show that the structure characterizing large wind pressures is well represented by the dominant eigenmodes (up to the first fifteen eigenmodes). Also, wind pressures with large peak values are simulated very well using the dominant eigenmodes along with the principal coordinates generated by the AR models.

In the 1990s, four strong typhoons hit the Kyushu area of Japan and inflicted severe damage on power transmission facilities, houses, and so on. Maximum gust speeds exceeding 60 m/s were recorded in central Kyushu. Although the wind speeds were very high, the gust factors were over 2.0. No meteorological stations are located in mountainous areas, creating a deficiency of meteorological station data in the area where the towers were damaged. Since 1995 the authors have operated a network for wind measurement, NeWMeK, that measures wind speed and direction, covering these mountainous areas, segmenting the Kyushu area into high density arrays. Maximum gusts exceeding 70 m/s were measured at several NeWMeK sites when Typhoon Bart (1999) approached. The gust factors varied widely in southerly winds. The mean wind speeds increased due to effects of the local terrain, thus further increasing gust speeds.