• Smart Structures and Systems
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• 제2권2호
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• pp.141-154
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• 2006

Recently, the Hilbert-Huang transform (HHT) has gained considerable attention as a novel technique of signal processing, which shows promise for the system identification and damage detection of structures. This study investigates the effectiveness and accuracy of the HHT method for the system identification and damage detection of structures through a series of experiments. A multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) structural model has been constructed with modular members, and the columns of the model can be replaced or removed to simulate damages at different locations with different severities. The measured response data of the structure due to an impulse loading is first decomposed into modal responses using the empirical mode decomposition (EMD) approach with a band-pass filter technique. Then, the Hilbert transform is subsequently applied to each modal response to obtain the instantaneous amplitude and phase angle time histories. A linear least-square fit procedure is used to identify the natural frequencies and damping ratios from the instantaneous amplitude and phase angle for each modal response. When the responses at all degrees of freedom are measured, the mode shape and the physical mass, damping and stiffness matrices of the structure can be determined. Based on a comparison of the stiffness of each story unit prior to and after the damage, the damage locations and severities can be identified. Experimental results demonstrate that the HHT method yields quite accurate results for engineering applications, providing a promising tool for structural health monitoring.

• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• 제2권3호
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• pp.181-197
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• 2015

Assessing the condition of paint on civil structures is an important but challenging and costly task, in particular when it comes to large and complex structures. Current practices of visual inspection are labour-intensive and time-consuming to perform. In addition, this task usually relies on the experience and subjective judgment of individual inspectors. In this study, hyperspectral imaging and classification techniques are proposed as a method to objectively assess the state of the paint on a civil or other structure. The ultimate objective of the work is to develop a technology that can provide precise and automatic grading of paint condition and assessment of degradation due to age or environmental factors. Towards this goal, we acquired hyperspectral images of steel surfaces located at long (mid-range) and short distances on the Sydney Harbour Bridge with an Acousto-Optics Tunable filter (AOTF) hyperspectral camera (consisting of 21 bands in the visible spectrum). We trained a multi-class Support Vector Machines (SVM) classifier to automatically assess the grading of the paint from hyperspectral signatures. Our results demonstrate that the classifier generates highly accurate assessment of the paint condition in comparison to the judgement of human experts.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• 제29권5호
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• pp.635-645
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• 2018

Beam-column joints play a significant role in static and dynamic performances of reinforced concrete frame structures. This study contributes a numerical approach of topologically optimal design of carbon fiber reinforced plastics (CFRP) to retrofit existing beam-column connections with crack patterns. In recent, CFRP is used commonly in the rehabilitation and strengthening of concrete members due to the remarkable properties, such as lightweight, anti-corrosion and simplicity to execute construction. With the target to provide an optimal CFRP configuration to effectively retrofit the beam-column connection under semi-failure situation such as given cracks, extended finite element method (X-FEM) is used by combining with multi-material topology optimization (MTO) as a mechanical description approach for strong discontinuity state to mechanically model cracked structures. The well founded mathematical formulation of topology optimization problem for cracked structures by using multiple materials is described in detail in this study. In addition, moved and regularized Heaviside functions (MRHF), that have the role of a filter in multiple materials case, is also considered. The numerical example results illustrated in two cases of beam-column joints with stationary cracks verify the validity, benefit and supremacy of the proposed method.

• Wind and Structures
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• 제28권2호
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• pp.99-110
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• 2019

Vortex-Induced-Vibration (VIV) is one kind of the wind-induced vibrations, which may occur in the construction and operation period of bridges. This phenomenon can bring negative effects to the traffic safety or can cause bridge fatigue damage and should be eliminated or controlled within safe amplitudes.In the current VIV studies, one available mitigation countermeasure, the horizontal flow-isolating plate, shows satisfactory performance particularly in PI shaped bridge deck type. Details of the wind tunnel test are firstly presented to give an overall description of this appendage and its control effect. Then, the computational-fluid-dynamics(CFD) method is introduced to investigate the control mechanism, using two-dimensional Large-Eddy-Simulation to reproduce the VIV process. The Reynolds number of the cases involved in this paper ranges from $1{\times}10^5$ to $3{\times}10^5$, using the width of bridge deck as reference length. A field-filter technique and detailed analysis on wall pressure are used to give an intuitive demonstration of the changes brought by the horizontal flow-isolating plate. Results show that this aerodynamic appendage is equally effective in suppressing vertical and torsional VIV, indicating inspiring application prospect in similar PI shaped bridge decks.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제71권6호
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• pp.683-697
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• 2019

The reinforced concrete (RC) structures usually suffer large residual displacements under strong motions. The large residual displacements may substantially reduce the anti-seismic capacity of structures during the aftershock and increase the difficulty and cost of structural repair after an earthquake. To reduce the adverse residual displacement, several self-centering energy dissipation braces (SCEBs) have been proposed to be installed to the RC structures. To investigate the seismic responses of the RC structures with SCEBs under the earthquake excitation, an extended Bouc-Wen model with degradation and self-centering effects is developed in this study. The extended model realized by MATLAB/Simulink program is able to capture the hysteretic characteristics of the RC structures with SCEBs, such as the energy dissipation and the degradation, especially the self-centering effect. The predicted hysteretic behavior of the RC structures with SCEBs based on the extended model, which used the unscented Kalman filter (UKF) for parameter identification, is compared with the experimental results. Comparison results show that the predicted hysteretic curves can be in good agreement with the experimental results. The nonlinear dynamic analyses using the extended model are then carried out to explore the seismic performance of the RC structures with SCEBs. The analysis results demonstrate that the SCEB can effectively reduce the residual displacements of the RC structures, but slightly increase the acceleration.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• 제30권3호
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• pp.273-286
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• 2022

In recent years, vision-based monitoring has received great attention. However, structural identification using vision-based displacement measurements is far less established. Especially, simultaneous identification of structural systems and unknown excitation using vision-based displacement measurements is still a challenging task since the unknown excitations do not appear directly in the observation equations. Moreover, measurement accuracy deteriorates over a wider field of view by vision-based monitoring, so, only a portion of the structure is measured instead of targeting a whole structure when using monocular vision. In this paper, the identification of structural system and excitations using vision-based displacement measurements is investigated. It is based on substructure identification approach to treat of problem of limited field of view of vision-based monitoring. For the identification of a target substructure, substructure interaction forces are treated as unknown inputs. A smoothing extended Kalman filter with unknown inputs without direct feedthrough is proposed for the simultaneous identification of substructure and unknown inputs using vision-based displacement measurements. The smoothing makes the identification robust to measurement noises. The proposed algorithm is first validated by the identification of a three-span continuous beam bridge under an impact load. Then, it is investigated by the more difficult identification of a frame and unknown wind excitation. Both examples validate the good performances of the proposed method.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제83권4호
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• pp.537-549
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• 2022

In this paper, a novel multi-feature model predictive control (MPC) framework with real-time and adaptive performances is proposed for intelligent structural control in which some drawbacks of the algorithm including, complex control rule and non-optimality, are alleviated. Hence, Linear Programming (LP) is utilized to simplify the resulted control rule. Afterward, the Whale Optimization Algorithm (WOA) is applied to the optimal and adaptive tuning of the LP weights independently at each time step. The stochastic control rule is also achieved using Kalman Filter (KF) to handle noisy measurements. The Extreme Learning Machine (ELM) is then adopted to develop a data-driven and real-time control algorithm. The efficiency of the developed algorithm is then demonstrated by numerical simulation of a twenty-story high-rise benchmark building subjected to earthquake excitations. The competency of the proposed method is proven from the aspects of optimality, stochasticity, and adaptivity compared to the KF-based MPC (KMPC) and constrained MPC (CMPC) algorithms in vibration suppression of building structures. The average value for performance indices in the near-field and far-field (El earthquakes demonstrates a reduction up to 38.3% and 32.5% compared with KMPC and CMPC, respectively.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• 제30권4호
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• pp.385-395
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• 2022

Detecting cracks on a concrete structure is crucial for structural maintenance, a crack being an indicator of possible damage. Conventional crack detection methods which include visual inspection and non-destructive equipment, are typically limited to a small region and require time-consuming processes. Recently, to reduce the human intervention in the inspections, various researchers have sought computer vision-based crack analyses: One class is filter-based methods, which effectively transforms the image to detect crack edges. The other class is using deep-learning algorithms. For example, convolutional neural networks have shown high precision in identifying cracks in an image. However, when the objective is to classify not only the existence of crack but also the types of cracks, only a few studies have been reported, limiting their practical use. Thus, the presented study develops an image processing procedure that detects cracks and classifies crack types; whether the image contains a crazing-type, single crack, or multiple cracks. The properties and steps in the algorithm have been developed using field-obtained images. Subsequently, the algorithm is validated from additional 227 images obtained from an open database. For test datasets, the proposed algorithm showed accuracy of 92.8% in average. In summary, the developed algorithm can precisely classify crazing-type images, while some single crack images may misclassify into multiple cracks, yielding conservative results. As a result, the successful results of the presented study show potentials of using vision-based technologies for providing crack information with reduced human intervention.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• 제33권5호
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• pp.519-528
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• 2023

In this paper, we present the results of an experimental study on the effect of polymer support fluid on shaft resistance of offshore bored piles. A series of pullout tests were performed on bored piles installed under various boundary conditions considering different types of grounds and support fluids, and a range of support fluid exposure times. Contrary to previous studies concerning onshore bored piles, a time dependent effect of polymer fluid on shaft resistance was observed in all ground types. The adverse effect of polymer support fluid on the shaft resistance, however, was considerably less than bentonite support fluid for a given exposure time. No significant reduction in shaft resistance was evident when limiting the exposure time of the polymer support fluid to the side wall of the borehole within 2-3 hours. The degree to which the polymer fluid affects shaft resistance seemed to vary with the ground type. A proper consideration should be given to the time dependent effect of polymer fluid on shaft resistance of bored piles installed in offshore construction environment to limit its adverse effect on the pile performance. The practical implications of the findings are discussed.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• 제44권4호
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• pp.545-555
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• 2022

Empirical relationships that capture the nonlinear behavior of headed steel shear stud anchors have been derived from standard push out tests, where the specimens are comprised of large wide flanged steel sections attached to flat concrete slabs via the anchors. However, many composite systems used in practice utilize much smaller steel members and/or steel decking as part of the slab system. Composite open web steel joist systems generally include both of these elements and consequently the nonlinear performance ofthe anchor is not accurately represented by existing models. In this paper, a new empirical relation is presented for open web steel joist systems based on experimental results from a modified push out test that more realistically represent a composite open web steel joist system. The methodology for obtaining the proposed nonlinear function where the response of the system is characterized by two parameters(α and β) is presented. The two-step process for obtaining the two parameters is described and the empirical relation is calibrated with the experimental data. In comparison with existing expressions, the new proposal herein more accurately predicts the high initialstiffness of the system and overall nonlinear system performance.