Development of a software platform for bridge modal and damage identification based on ambient excitation

Abstract

Modal and damage identification based on ambient excitation can greatly improve the efficiency of high-speed railway bridge vibration detection. This paper first describes the basic principles of stochastic subspace identification, peak-picking, and frequency domain decomposition method in modal analysis based on ambient excitation, and the effectiveness of these three methods is verified through finite element calculation and numerical simulation. Then the damage element is added to the finite element model to simulate the crack, and the curvature mode difference and the curvature mode area difference square ratio are calculated by using the stochastic subspace identification results to verify their ability of damage identification and location. Finally, the above modal and damage identification techniques are integrated to develop a bridge modal and damage identification software platform. The final results show that all three modal identification methods can accurately identify the vibration frequency and mode shape, both damage identification methods can accurately identify and locate the damage, and the developed software platform is simple and efficient.

Keywords

• Vibration detection
• Software development
• Modal identification
• Damage identification
• Numerical verification