Operational modal analysis of a fixed-fixed beam under moving vehicular loads

Structural health monitoring of bridges as an infrastructure is essential to prevent damaging and collapse. For continuous monitoring, the operating traffic loads can be used as a good source of excitation. However, due to the unknown amount and random nature of the road excitation and the inherent uncertainties in a bridge-vehicle system, it’s challenging. In this paper, for the purpose of operational modal analysis (OMA), an efficient output-only modal analysis technique named stochastic subspace identification method (SSI) is used. First, a finite element model of an elastic beam excited with a mass train traversing the span is validated and calibrated using the dynamic response of an experiment. Then, further study is done on the developed model by simulating a real test and investigate OMA method.

Keywords:

Structural health monitoring , Operational modal analysis , Stochastic subspace identification , Vehicular load excitation