• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.71 no.4
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• pp.391-405
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• 2019

Compared to the ambient vibration test mainly identifying the structural modal parameters, such as frequency, damping and mode shapes, the impact testing, which benefits from measuring both impacting forces and structural responses, has the merit to identify not only the structural modal parameters but also more detailed structural parameters, in particular flexibility. However, in traditional impact tests, an impacting hammer or artificial excitation device is employed, which restricts the efficiency of tests on various bridge structures. To resolve this problem, we propose a new method whereby a moving vehicle is taken as a continuous exciter and develop a corresponding flexibility identification theory, in which the continuous wheel forces induced by the moving vehicle is considered as structural input and the acceleration response of the bridge as the output, thus a structural flexibility matrix can be identified and then structural deflections of the bridge under arbitrary static loads can be predicted. The proposed method is more convenient, time-saving and cost-effective compared with traditional impact tests. However, because the proposed test produces a spatially continuous force while classical impact forces are spatially discrete, a new flexibility identification theory is required, and a novel structural identification method involving with equivalent load distribution, the enhanced Frequency Response Function (eFRFs) construction and modal scaling factor identification is proposed to make use of the continuous excitation force to identify the basic modal parameters as well as the structural flexibility. Laboratory and numerical examples are given, which validate the effectiveness of the proposed method. Furthermore, parametric analysis including road roughness, vehicle speed, vehicle weight, vehicle's stiffness and damping are conducted and the results obtained demonstrate that the developed method has strong robustness except that the relative error increases with the increase of measurement noise.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.841-859
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• 2016

Bridge bearings are important connection elements between bridge superstructures and substructures, whose health states directly affect the performance of the bridges. This paper systematacially presents a new method to identify the bridge bearing damage based on the neural network theory. Firstly, based on the analysis of different damage types, a description of the bearing damage is introduced, and a uniform description for all the damage types is given. Then, the feasibility and sensitivity of identifying the bearing damage with bridge vibration modes are investigated. After that, a Radial Basis Function Neural Network (RBFNN) is built, whose input and output are the beam modal information and the damage information, respectively. Finally, trained by plenty of data samples formed by the numerical method, the network is employed to identify the bearing damage. Results show that the bridge bearing damage can be clearly reflected by the modal information of the bridge beam, which validates the effectiveness of the proposed method.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.556-562
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• 2007

This paper presents the use of a novel fiber optic accelerometer system to monitor ambient vibration (both wind-induced one and vehicle-induced) of a real bridge structure. This sensor system integrates the $Moir\'{e}$ fringe phenomenon with fiber optics to achieve accurate and reliable measurements. A low-cost signal processing unit implements unique algorithms to further enhance the resolution and increase the dynamic bandwidth of the sensors. The fiber optic accelerometer has two major benefits in using this fiber optic accelerometer system for monitoring civil engineering structures. One is its immunity to electromagnetic (EM) interference making it suitable for difficult applications in such environments involving strong EM fields, electrical spark-induced explosion risks, and cabling problems, prohibiting the use of conventional electromagnetic accelerometers. The other is its ability to measure both low- and high-amplitude vibrations with a constantly high resolution without pre-setting a gain level, as usually required in a conventional accelerometer. The second benefit makes the sensor system particularly useful for real-time measurement of both ambient vibration (that is often used for structural health monitoring) and strong motion such as earthquake. Especially, the semi-strong motion and the small ambient one are successfully simulated and measured by using the new fiber optic accelerometer in the experiment of the structural health monitoring of a real bridge.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.71-82
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• 2000

Ground vibration analysis methods for Light Rail Transit(LRT) on bridges are studied. LRT loads acting on the piers are evaluated considering interactions between trains and a bridge. Two dimensional in-plane and axisymmetric wave propagations are used in ground vibration analyses, and then the results of them are compared one another. A modified axisymmetric method is presented, which can consider the effect of the train loadings on a series of piers as the train moves. Parametric studies are carried out for various train speeds, bridge types and geotechnical conditions to investigate the characteristics of ground vibrations.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2000.04a
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• pp.218-225
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• 2000

This paper presents intermediate results of an on-going research for identification of the modal and the stiffness parameters of a bridge based on the ambient vibration data caused by the traffic loadings. The main algorithms consist of the random decrement method incorporating band-pass filters for estimation of the free vibration signals the cross spectral density method for identification of the modal parameters and the neural networks technique for estimation of the element-level stiffness changes. An experimental study is carried out on a scaled bridge model with a composite section subjected to various moving vehicle loadings. Vertical accelerations are measured at several locations on the girder. The estimated frequencies and mode shapes are found to be well-compared with those obtained from the impact tests. The estimated stiffness changes using the neural networks are found to be very good for the case with the simulated data. However the accuracy is found to be not quite satisfactory for the case with the experimental data particularly for the small value of the stiffness changes.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.66 no.6
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• pp.749-759
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• 2018

Aiming at widely used high-pier bridges in Sichuan-Tibet Railway, this paper presents an investigation to design and evaluate the seismic vibration reduction effects of several measures, including viscous damper (VD), friction pendulum bearing (FPB), and tuned mass damper (TMD). Primarily, according to the detailed introduction of the concerned bridge structure, dynamic models of high-pier bridges with different seismic vibration reduction (SVR) measures are established. Further, the designs for these SVR measures are performed, and the optimal parameters of these measures are investigated. On this basis, the vibration reduction effects of these measures are analyzed and assessed subject to actual earthquake excitations in Wenchuan Earthquake (M=8.0), and the most appropriate SVR measure for high-pier bridges in Sichuan-Tibet Railway is determined at the end of the work. Results show that the height of pier does not obviously affect the performances of the concerned SVR measures. Comprehensively considering the vibration absorption performance, installation and maintenance of all the employed measures in this paper, TMD is the best one to absorb vibrations induced by earthquakes.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.63 no.6
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• pp.761-769
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• 2017

Accurately extracting the axle distribution information of a passing vehicle from bridge dynamic responses experiences a key and challenging step in non-pavement bridge weigh-in-motion (BWIM). In this article, the wavelet transformation is adopted and the wavelet coefficient curve is used as a substitute for dynamic response. The driving frequency is introduced and expanded to multi-axle vehicle, and the wavelet coefficient curve on specific scale corresponding to the driving frequency is confirmed to contain obvious axle information. On this basis, an automatic method for axle distribution information identification is proposed. The specific wavelet scale can be obtained through iterative computing, and the false peaks due to bridge vibration can be eliminated through cross-correlation analysis of the wavelet coefficients of two measure points. The integrand function that corresponds to the maximum value of the cross-correlation function is used to identify the peaks caused by axles. A numerical application of the proposed axle information identification method is carried out. Numerical results demonstrate that this method acquires precise axle information from the responses of an axle-insensitive structure (e.g., girder) and decreases the requirement of sensitivity structure of BWIM. Finally, an experimental study on a full-scale simply supported bridge is also conducted to verify the effectiveness of this method.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.233-245
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• 2011

A new BWIM(bridge weigh-in-motion) algorithm using both measured strain and acceleration data is proposed. To consider the effects of bridge vibration on the estimation of moving loads, the dynamic governing equation is applied with the known stiffness and mass properties but damping is ignored. Dynamic displacements are computed indirectly from the measured strains using the beam theory and accelerations are measured directly by accelerometers. To convert a unit moving load to its equivalent nodal force, a transformation matrix is determined. The incompleteness in the measured responses is considered in developing the algorithm. To examine the proposed BWIM algorithm, simulation studies, laboratory experiments and field tests were carried. In the simulation study, effects of measurement noise and estimation error in the vehicle speed on the results were investigated.

• Proceedings of the KSR Conference
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.511-516
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• 2007

Rubber wheeled AGT(Automated Guide-way Transit) system is a prominence transportation system for urban area, because of its low construction cost and management, low noise and vibration and fine exterior view. AGT system uses concrete tracks. Concrete can be easily damaged by the impact, change of temperature and external loads. The fault of concrete track is harmful not only to riding quality but also to bridge. Therefore, in this study, the effects of railway prominence to the bridge are surveyed by experimental method. The experiment was executed for PSC bridge at AGT test line in Kyungsan. And the test results for 5mm, 10mm prominence and without prominence are compared and investigated, according to the vehicle speed.

• Journal of the Society of Disaster Information
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.258-266
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• 2017

Cable-stayed bridges are bridges with long spans for special purposes. Due to the long span, the dynamic response of the vehicle to the moving load is very special. The behavior also has nonlinear, which makes it difficult to design. In this study, the responses of cable - stayed bridges are considered considering various vehicle loads and the behavior of long - span bridges under moving loads is investigated. Especially, when the loads for one direction and for both directions move with speed, the behavior of the bridges is found to be due to the flexibility of the cable. It can be seen that the analysis including the dynamic behavior of the cable and the top plate is more effective because the influence of the vehicle load tends to amplify the vertical deformation together with the vibration of the cable.