• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.313-320
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• 2003

The efficient and well organized database is essential for the management of information in every industrial field. In this study, a practical and effective database which can handle 3-D information of steel bridges is built on the basis of a STEP-based data model. The data model of steel bridge information is classified into geometric and non-geometric part and the design information is represented by linking geometric information and life cycle supported non-geometric information. Especially, the shape information is represented by boundary representation method, which is one of the representative methods of solid model information. In this study, ISO/STEP(STandard for the Exchange of product model data) AP203(configuration controlled design) EXPRESS schema is used to represent the shape information of steel bridge. The syntax of EXPRESS schema of developed data model is verified by NIST Expresso - is a tool for parsing and compiling EXPRESS schema. Also, this study verifies the conformance of the data model by applying to the real data of Hannam bridge. Therefore, the constructed database using STEP-based data model of steel bridges can be used effectively in the concurrent engineering point of view with transferring and sharing steel bridge information.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.1-20
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• 2014

Modern design of long suspension bridges must satisfy at the same time spanning very long distances and limiting their response against several external loads, even if of high intensity. Structural Control, with the solutions it provides, can offer a reliable contribution to limit internal forces and deformations in structural elements when extreme events occur. This positive aspect is very interesting when the dimensions of the structure are large. Herein, an updated numerical model of an existing suspension bridge is developed in a commercial finite element work frame, starting from original data. This model is used to reevaluate an optimization procedure for a passive control strategy, already proven effective with a simplified model of the buffeting wind forces. Such optimization procedure, previously implemented with a quasi-steady model of the buffeting excitation, is here reevaluated adopting a more refined version of the wind-structure interaction forces in which wind actions are applied on the towers and the cables considering drag forces only. For the deck a more refined formulation, based on the use of indicial functions, is adopted to reflect coupling with the bridge orientation and motion. It is shown that there is no variation of the previously identified optimal passive configuration.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.507-518
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• 2014

This paper presents a new cascaded asymmetrical single phase multilevel converter with a lower number of power semiconductor switches and isolated DC sources. Therefore, the number of power electronic devices, converter losses, size, and cost are reduced. The proposed multilevel converter topology consists of two H-bridges connected in cascaded configuration. One H-bridge operates at a high frequency (high frequency inverter) and is capable of developing a two level output while the other H-bridge operates at the fundamental frequency (low frequency inverter) and is capable of developing a multilevel output. The addition of each power electronic switch to the low frequency inverter increases the number of levels by four. This paper also introduces a hybrid switching algorithm which uses very simple arithmetic and logical operations. The simplified hybrid switching algorithm is generalized for any number of levels. The proposed simplified switching algorithm is developed using a TMS320F2812 DSP board. The operation and performance of the proposed multilevel converter are verified by simulations using MATLAB/SIMULINK and experimental results.

• Journal of IKEEE
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.636-641
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• 2019

A simple resistance deviation-to-time period converter is proposed for interfacing resistive half-bridge sensors. It consists of two 2nd generation current conveyors(CCIIs). The proposed converter has simpler circuit configuration than the conventional converters using operational amplifiers or operational transconductance amplifiers(OTAs). The proposed converter was simulated using CCII implemented with AD844 IC chips. The simulation results show that the converter has a conversion sensitivity of $0.01934ms/{\Omega}$ over a range of $100-500{\Omega}$ resistance deviations and a linearity error less than ${\pm}0.002%$.

• Journal of IKEEE
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.1218-1223
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• 2019

In HVDC systems, the full-bridge submodule increases the number of components compared to the half-bridge submodule, but the failure-rate can be reduced by securing 100 % redundancy. However, full-bridge submodules require more complex control algorithms to ensure the redundancy and to prevent arm-short with sufficient dead-time. To solve this problem, we analyse the failure-rate of the paralleled half-bridge configuration with the same number of components and 100 % redundancy as the full-bridge submodule. The fault tree analysis (FTA) method is applied to the conventional part failure analysis to reflect the operation risk of the submodule, thereby predicting the life-cycle of the submodule more accurately. To verify the validity, the failure-rate results of the proposed FTA based analysis method are compared with the failure rate obtained by the part failure method.

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 2006.04a
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• pp.283-290
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• 2006

Cable-stayed bridge is a bridge that consists of one or more pylons, with cables supporting the deck. Cable-stayed bridges have come into wide use recently because of their economy, stability, and excellent appearance. It is possible to achieve a uniform moment distribution in the stiffening girders mainly by prestressing the cables, which leads to a more economical design in material and weight than other types of bridges. However, to achieve a more uniform moment distribution is vague objective, so it cannot be easily defined as the optimization problem. In other words, the minimization of cost or weight as the objective is not directly related to the optimization of cable prestressing. Therefore, it has been considered as one of the most important, difficult and also interesting topics among many researchers and bridge engineers to determine the optimal tensioning strategy how to apply prestressing forces of the cables of cable-stayed bridge. A number of approaches (Wang et al. 1993, $Negr\~{a}o\;and\;Sim\~{o}es$ 1997, Agrawal 1997, Janjic et al. 2003) to determine the optimal cable tensions have been proposed in the literature. Among these approaches the unit load method (Janjic et al. 2003) is considered in this paper because it can take into account the actual construction process while other approaches are based on the configuration of the final structure only. In this paper, '2-step approach' based on the unit load method is proposed to find the optimal tensioning strategy especially for the atypical asymmetric bridge under construction, which has continuous deck supported by one pylon and stay cables. Some numerical results will be given to show the validity of the new approach suggested in this paper.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.74 no.2
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• pp.157-173
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• 2020

In the finite element modelling of long-span cable-stayed bridges, there are a lot of uncertainties brought about by the complex structural configuration, material behaviour, boundary conditions, structural connections, etc. In order to reduce the discrepancies between the theoretical finite element model and the actual static and dynamic behaviour, updating is indispensable after establishment of the finite element model to provide a reliable baseline version for further analysis. Traditional sensitivity-based updating methods cannot support updating based on static and dynamic measurement data at the same time. The finite element model is required in every optimization iteration which limits the efficiency greatly. A convenient but accurate Kriging surrogate model for updating of the finite element model of cable-stayed bridge is proposed. First, a simple cable-stayed bridge is used to verify the method and the updating results of Kriging model are compared with those using the response surface model. Results show that Kriging model has higher accuracy than the response surface model. Then the method is utilized to update the model of a long-span cable-stayed bridge in Hong Kong. The natural frequencies are extracted using various methods from the ambient data collected by the Wind and Structural Health Monitoring System installed on the bridge. The maximum deflection records at two specific locations in the load test form the updating objective function. Finally, the fatigue lives of the structure at two cross sections are calculated with the finite element models before and after updating considering the mean stress effect. Results are compared with those calculated from the strain gauge data for verification.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.10 no.5
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• pp.463-479
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• 2007

A series of wind tunnel sectional model dynamic tests of a twin-deck bridge were conducted at the CLP Power Wind/Wave Tunnel Facility (WWTF) of The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) to investigate the effects of gap-width on the self-excited vibrations and the dynamic and aerodynamic characteristics of the bridge. Five 2.9 m long models with different gap-widths were fabricated and suspended in the wind tunnel to simulate a two-degrees-of-freedom (2DOF) bridge dynamic system, free to vibrate in both vertical and torsional directions. The mass, vertical frequency, and the torsional-to-vertical frequency ratio of the 2DOF systems were fixed to emphasize the effects of gap-width. A free-vibration test methodology was employed and the Eigensystem Realization Algorithm (ERA) was utilized to extract the eight flutter derivatives and the modal parameters from the coupled free-decay responses. The results of the zero gap-width configuration were in reasonable agreement with the theoretical values for an ideal thin flat plate in smooth flow and the published results of models with similar cross-sections, thus validating the experimental and analytical techniques utilized in this study. The methodology was further verified by the comparison between the measured and predicted free-decay responses. A comparison of results for different gap-widths revealed that variations of the gap-width mainly affect the torsional damping property, and that the configurations with greater gap-widths show a higher torsional damping ratio and hence stronger aerodynamic stability of the bridge.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.224-229
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• 2003

The rapid expansion of small computers over the last 10-odd years has brought about great changes in the circumstances affecting UPSs. There are strong demands that UPSs become much smaller and lighter, and more economical, which has resulted in the wide application of the circuit topology without transformer. A disadvantage of such UPS topology is that the DC link voltage is very high, which invites decreased reliability and increased cost of battery bank. Some circuit configurations were proposed to eliminate this disadvantage, but they still had problems. In this paper, a novel circuit configuration which eliminates these problems is proposed and evaluated by the experimental results of prototype UPS.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2004.11b
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• pp.31-35
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• 2004

This paper proposes a new configuration of 36-pulse voltage source converter which consists of two 6-pulse bridges and a pulse-interleaving auxiliary circuit. The system topology of proposed converter was derived to increase the pulse number of converter output voltage without increasing the number of 6-pulse bridges. The gate pulse generation was analyzed using the theoretical approach of multi-pulse switching converter. The operational feasibility of proposed system was verified by computer simulations with PSCAD/TMTDC software and experimental works with 3kVA hardware prototype. The proposed converter can be widely used for the uninterruptible power supply, the power quality compensator, and the distributed power generation, such as solar and fuel fell power system.