• Wind and Structures
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.1-14
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• 2002

Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) have the capability to develop functional relationships between input-output patterns obtained from any source. Thus ANN can be conveniently used to develop a generalised relationship from limited and sometimes inconsistent data, and can therefore also be applied to tackle the data obtained from wind tunnel tests on building models with large number of variables. In this paper ANN model has been developed for predicting wind induced pressures in various zones of a Gable Building from limited test data. The procedure is also extended to a case wherein interference effects on a gable roof building by a similar building are studied. It is found that the Artificial Neural Network modelling is seen to predict successfully, the pressure coefficients for any roof slope that has not been covered by the experimental study. It is seen that ANN modelling can lead to a reduction of the wind tunnel testing effort for interference studies to almost half.

• International Journal of High-Rise Buildings
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.145-156
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• 2022

Application examples of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) in the planning stage of high-rise buildings are introduced. First, we introduce examples of applications in the environmental field. The pedestrian wind environment was one of the earliest practical examples of CFD. CFD was also employed to validate the heat island mitigation measures proposed as part of the new construction plan. Second, application examples of wind-force evaluations are introduced. Prediction examples are presented for the peak wind pressure around a complex-shaped building and the wind force evaluation for a base-isolated building. The results prove that the results of the proper execution of CFD are equivalent to those of the wind tunnel experiment. As examples of CFD applications of other issues related to high-rise building planning, we introduce snow accretion on outer walls and high-temperature exhaust from emergency generators. Finally, the future prospects for the use of CFD are discussed.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.275-289
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• 2008

Large eddy simulations have been performed within and over different types of urban building arrays. This paper adopted three dimensionless parameters, building frontal area density (${\lambda}_f$) the variation degree of building height (${\sigma}_h$), and the staggered degree of building range ($r_s$), to study the systematic influence of building spacing, height and layout on wind and turbulent characteristics. The following results have been achieved: (1) As ${\lambda}_f$ decrease from 0.25 to 0.18, the mean flow patterns transfer from "skimming" flow to "wake interference" flow, and as ${\lambda}_f$ decrease from 0.06 to 0.04, the mean flow patterns transfer from "wake interference" flow to "isolated roughness" flow. With increasing ${\lambda}_f$, wind velocity within arrays increases, and the vortexes in front of low buildings would break, even disappear, whereas the vortexes in front of tall buildings would strengthen and expand. Tall buildings have greater disturbance on wind than low buildings do. (2) All the wind velocity profiles and the upstream profile converge at the height of 2.5H approximately. The decay of wind velocity within the building canopy was in positive correlation with ${\lambda}_f$ and $r_s$. If the height of building arrays is variable, Macdonald's wind velocity model should be modified through introducing ${\sigma}_h$, because wind velocity decreases at the upper layers of the canopy and increases at the lower layers of the canopy. (3) The maximum of turbulence kinetic energy (TKE) always locates at 1.2 times as high as the buildings. TKE within the canopy decreases with increasing ${\lambda}_f$ and $r_s$ but the maximum of TKE are very close though ${\sigma}_h$ varies. (4) Wind velocity profile follows the logarithmic law approximately above the building canopy. The Zero-plane displacement $z_d$ heighten with increasing ${\lambda}_f$, whereas the maximum of and Roughness length $z_0$ occurs when ${\lambda}_f$ is about 0.14. $z_d$ and $z_0$ heighten linearly with ${\sigma}_h$ and $r_s$, If ${\sigma}_h$ is large enough, $z_d$ may become higher than the average height of buildings.

• Computational Structural Engineering : An International Journal
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.61-68
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• 2003

A recently developed semi-active control system employing magneto-rheological (MR) fluid dampers is applied to vibration control of a wind excited tall building. The semi-active control system with MR fluid dampers appears to have the reliability of passive control devices and the adaptability of fully active control systems. The system requires only small power source, which is critical during severe events, when the main power source may fail. Numerical simulation studies are performed to demonstrate the efficiency of the MR dampers on the third ASCE benchmark problem. Multiple MR dampers are assumed to be installed in the 76-story building. Genetic algorithm is applied to determine the optimal locations and capacities of the MR dampers. Clipped optimal controller is designed to control the MR dampers based on the acceleration feedback. To verify the robustness with respect to the variation of the external wind force, several cases with different wind forces are considered in the numerical simulation. Simulation results show that the semi-actively controlled MR dampers can effectively reduce both the peak and RMS responses the tall building under various wind force conditions. The control performance of the MR dampers for wind is found to be fairly similar to the performance of an active tuned mass damper.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.389-404
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• 2015

In this study, residential building damage states observed from a post-tornado damage survey in Joplin after a 2011 EF 5 tornado were used to reconstruct the near-surface wind field. It was based on well-studied relationships between Degrees of Damage (DOD) of building and wind speeds in the Enhanced Fujita (EF) scale. A total of 4,166 one- or two-family residences (FR12) located in the study area were selected and their DODs were recorded. Then, the wind speeds were estimated with the EF scale. The peak wind speed profile estimated from damage of buildings was used to fit a translating analytical vortex model. Agreement between simulated peak wind speeds and observed damages confirms the feasibility of using post-tornado damage surveys for reconstructing the near-surface wind field. In addition to peak wind speeds, the model can create the time history of wind speed and direction at any given point, offering opportunity to better understand tornado parameters and wind field structures. Future work could extend the method to tornadoes of different characteristics and therefore improve model's generalizability.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.105-114
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• 2021

This paper describes a wind tunnel test on a 1:25 scale model of TTU building with several adjustable openings in order to comprehensively study the characteristics of fluctuating internal pressures, especially the phenomenon of the increase in fluctuating internal pressures induced by tangential flow over building openings and the mechanism causing that. The effects of several factors, such as wind angle, turbulence intensity, opening location, opening size, opening shape and background porosity on the fluctuating internal pressures at oblique wind angles are also described. It has been found that there is a large increase in the fluctuating internal pressures at certain oblique wind angles (typically around 60° to 80°). These fluctuations are greater than those produced by the flow normal to the opening when the turbulence intensity is low. It is demonstrated that the internal pressure resonances induced by the external pressure fluctuations emanating from flapping shear layers on the sidewall downstream of the windward corner are responsible for the increase in the fluctuating internal pressures. Furthermore, the test results show that apart from the opening shape, all the other factors influence the fluctuating internal pressures and the internal pressure resonances at oblique wind angles to varying degrees.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.223-234
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• 2018

In this study, a simplified three-dimensional calculation model is developed for the dynamic analysis of soil-pile group-supertall building systems excited by wind loads using the substructure method. Wind loads acting on a 300-m building in different wind directions and terrain conditions are obtained from synchronous pressure measurements conducted in a wind tunnel. The effects of soil-structure interaction (SSI) on the first natural frequency, wind-induced static displacement, root mean square (RMS) of displacement, and RMS of acceleration at the top of supertall buildings are analyzed. The findings demonstrate that with decreasing soil shear wave velocity, the first natural frequency decreases and the static displacement, RMS of displacement and RMS of acceleration increase. In addition, as soil material damping decreases, the RMS of displacement and the RMS of acceleration increase.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.309-324
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• 2005

Aerodynamic damping often plays an important role in estimations of wind induced dynamic responses of super high-rise buildings. Across- and along-wind aerodynamic damping ratios of a square super high-rise building with a height of 300 m are identified with the Random Decrement technique (RDT) from random vibration responses of the SDOF aeroelastic model in simulated wind fields. Parametric studies on effects of reduced wind velocity, terrain type and structural damping ratio on the aerodynamic damping ratios are further performed. Finally formulas of across- and along-wind aerodynamic damping ratios of the square super high-rise building are derived with curve fitting technique and accuracy of the formulas is verified.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.77-109
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• 1998

An evaluation and comparison of seven of the world's major building codes and standards is conducted in this study, with specific discussion of their estimations of the alongwind, acrosswind, and torsional response, where applicable, for a given building. The codes and standards highlighted by this study are those of the United States, Japan, Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, China and Europe. In addition, the responses predicted by using the measured power spectra of the alongwind, acrosswind and torsional responses for several building shapes tested in a wind tunnel are presented and a comparison between the response predicted by wind tunnel data and that estimated by some of the standards is conducted. This study serves not only as a comparison of the response estimates by international codes and standards, but also introduces a new set of wind tunnel data for validation of wind tunnel-based empirical expressions.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.323-340
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• 2008

In this paper, the along-wind, across-wind as well as torsional dynamic wind loads on three kinds of lattice tower models are investigated using the base balance technique in a boundary layer wind tunnel. The models were specially designed, and their fundamental frequencies in the directions of the three principal axes are still in the frequency range of the spectra of wind loads on lattice towers. In order to clear contaminations to the spectra of wind loads induced by model resonance, the generalized force spectra of the first mode of the models in along-wind, across-wind and torsional directions were derived based on measured base moments of the models. The RMS generalized force coefficients are also obtained by removing the contributions of model resonance. Finally, the characteristics of the 3-D dynamic wind loads, especially those of the across-wind dynamic loads, on the three kinds of lattice towers are presented and discussed.