Probabilistic damage identification of structures with uncertainty based on dynamic responses

Abstract

The probabilistic damage identification problem with uncertainty in the FE model parameters, external-excitations and measured acceleration responses is studied. The uncertainty in the system is concerned with normally distributed random variables with zero mean value and given covariance. Based on the theoretical model and the measured acceleration responses, the probabilistic structural models in undamaged and damaged states are obtained by two-stage model updating, and then the Probabilities of Damage Existence (PDE) of each element are calculated as the damage criterion. The influences of the location of sensors on the damage identification results are also discussed, where one of the optimal sensor placement techniques, the effective independence method, is used to choose the nodes for measurement. The damage identification results by different numbers of measured nodes and different damage criterions are compared in the numerical example.