Damage detection of a thin plate using pseudo local flexibility method

Abstract

The virtual forces of the original local flexibility method are restricted to inducing stress on the local parts of a structure. To circumvent this restriction, we developed a pseudo local flexibility (PLFM) method that can successfully detect damage to hyperstatic beam structures using fewer modes. For this study, we further developed the PLFM so that it could detect damage in plate structures. We also devised the theoretical background for the PLFM with non-local virtual forces for plate structures, and both the lateral and rotary degree of freedom (DOF) measurements were considered separately. This study investigates the effects of the number of modes, the actual location that sustained damage, multiple damage locations, and noise in modal parameters for the damage detection results obtained from damaged numerical plates. The results revealed that the PLFM can be used for damage detection, localization, and quantification for plate structures, regardless of the use of the lateral DOF and/or rotary DOF.