Wuhan University Journal of Natural Sciences

WUJHS

Vol. 10 No. 6 2005 1069-1073

Article ID:1007 1202(2005)06-1069-05

Detection of Structural DamageThrough Changes in Frequency

0
[] ZHU Hong-ping, HE Be, CHEN Xiao.qiang
School of Civil Engineering and Mechanics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, Hubei, China

Introduction

Abstract: Among all the structural vibration characteris tics, natural frequencies are relatively simple and accurate to measure, and provide the structural global damage informa lion. In this paper, the feasibility of using only natural fre quencies to identify structural damage is exploited by adopting two usual approaches, namely, sensitivity analysis and neural networks. Some aspects of damage detection such as the prohlem of incomplete modal test data and robustness of de tection are considered. A laboratory tested 3-storey frame is used to demonstrate the possibility of frequenc~based damage detection techniques. The numerical results show that the damaged element can be correctly localized and the content of damage can be identified with relatively high degree of accuracy hy using the changes in frequencies.

Key words: damage detection; changes in frequency; sen sltlvity analysis; neural network
CLC number: TP
206; TP, 53

Received date: 2004 12-20 Foundation item: Supported hy the National Natural .qx'ienccFoun

dation of China (No. 50378(141 ) and the Specialized Research Fund for the l)octoral Program of Higher Education ((;rant No. 2(}{}30487(}16). Biography: ZHU Honwping (1965), male, Professor, Ph. I)., re search direction: structural damage detection and structural vibration control. Email: hpzhu(a:mail, hust. edu. cn

he vibration-based damage detection approaches have been proposed and developed in the past 30 years, and the study on this topic is still active [ 1]. Since natural frequencies can provide the global information of structures, and can be exactly measured by the modern techniques of sensors and experimental modal analysis, more importantly, can be easily obtained even at a low level of excitation such as ambient test, the methods by using only changes in frequencies to detect the structural damage become feasible [2~. The studies showed good performance for frequency-based damage identification, however, only small degrees-o~freedom models were dealt with E2*]. For larger engineering structures, there are at least two reasons which limit the feasibility of the frequency-based method for damage detection. First, significant damage may cause very small changes in natural frequencies and these changes may go unidentified due to measurement or processing errors. Next, the number of measured natural frequencies is far less than the number of structural elements, which may induce a false result ~]. The objective of this paper is thus to exploit the possibility of using only natural frequencies to detect damage of structures, and moreover discuss under what conditions it may be sufficient to use only natural frequencies to locate and quantify damage correctly. Two commonly used methods, namely, sensitivity analysis and neural networks, are adopted in this study, and the influence of incomplete test data on the effectiveness of damage detection is considered. Additionally, an experimental investigation of a three-storey frame model is presented to demonstrate the potential and robust of the

Llnivet~ity Journal of f~turatScie~r

: Vol, t 0

N o , 6 2005

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frequency-based methods.

1 Frequency-Based Damage Detection

1.1 Sensitivity-Based Method
Assume that the structural damage can be directly expressed by the change of stiffness and the structural mass remains unchanged. ~o and kj are the nth natural (') frequency and the stiffness of the jth element. The sensitivity of the nth natural frequency to damage at element j, - - ,
6q03(n)

Oks

can be yielded by several ways. Zhu used the

characteristic receptance method to yield the relationship between the changes of the receptances of element and the natural frequencies of structure c47. For any combination of size and location of damage at one or more sites, it is assumed that the corresponding decreases in the natural frequencies can be written using a linear combination of the sensitivities in the form:
~0.)(1)
=

30-)(1)

c~7.U (1)

30.)(1)

ak--7- kl +
Oco (p)
1

+ ... + a-L- kN
&o(p)
+ ... +

&o(p) i.e.

&o(p) ..

a--L2 kN

{&o} = [S]{~k} (1) The set of simultaneous equations in Eq. (1) relate the change of the stiffness of each element, {Sk}, to the changes in the natural circular frequency of the structure, {&}. In reality, only a small number of natural frequencies can usually be measured. Hence, the number of the measured changes, p, is less than the number of elements, N, which renders the equations underdetermined. They can be solved uniquely only after the introduction of an optimality criterion. In this study, the optimization problem can be stated as that the best approximations are those which minimize the next matrix norm: g = II Es]{sk} II (2a) Since a positive change in the stiffness can never be produced by damage, the inequality constraint given in Eq. (2b) is introduced. {~k} <~ 0 (2b)

1.2 Neural Networks-Based Method

Back-propagation (BP) neural network has the capability of determining the mapping between inputs and outputs of the model from training samples of the field data presented to it. However, two practical problems, i.e., slow learning progress and convergence to a false local minimum, are usually encountered by the traditional

back-propagation method. Thus, in this study the modified back-propagation neural network proposed in Ref. [6] has been adopted. In this modified BP network, the basic idea to avoid the local minimum lies in reducing the sensitivity of weight changes to the local curvature of the error surface by adding a momentum factor into the weight, which allows a network to respond not only to the local gradient, but also to recent trends in the error surface, thus, acting like a low pass filter, allows the network to ignore small features in the error surface. Moreover, the changes of optimal learning rate are allowed during the training process so that the performance of the steepest descent algorithm can be improved, and therefore, the convergence can be accelerated. The optimal learning rate which is made responsive to the complexity of the local error surface will attempt to keep the learning step size as large as possible while keeping learning stable. The natural frequencies are used as the input patterns and the inter-storey stiffness of buildings is chosen as the output of the network representing the states of structural damage. The numbers of hidden layers and hidden nodes are determined by trial-and-error technique. The processing units in the hidden layers employ a nonlinear transfer function named logarithmic sigmoid transfer function (logsig) while the output nodes use linear transfer functions. In this study, numerical simulations from the original system are used as training and testing samples. When the training process is completed, all the independent variables of test samples are given to the network. Comparison of the sum of squared errors for different trained networks is used for testing the network's performance. Among the successfully trained networks, the network, which yields the lowest sum of squared errors of the test set, would be the most predictive network. The trained network is fed input data, which includes the test modal data obtained from the structure in two different states (damaged and undamaged). Then, the outputs from the trained network are compared to each other. If the network has been well trained, and if the characteristics of system have not changed, the two groups of outputs will have matched. On the contrary, if the system has changed or damaged, there will be a difference between the two outputs. The difference provides a quantitative measure of parameter change or structural damage.

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2 Application of A 3-storey Frame Test Model

2.1 The Intact Structure A three-storey steel frame consisting of three rigid plates and four flexible columns was designed and constructed. The frame was welded to a thick steel plate that was in turn bolted into the shake table floor. The dimensions and materials properties are given in details in Ref. ~72. The measurement was achieved by installing one accelerometer on each floor in the direction of weak stiffness and using white noise excited by shake table. The mass of each floor was 231 kg and the inter-storey shear stiffness of each floor a r e k I = 4. 839 8 X l0 '~ N/m, k2-- 5.740 5 10'~ N/m, k:~-- 5. 952 0N 10n N/ m, respectively, which were computed from the geometric dimension. The computed natural frequencies from the above stiffness and mass are 3. 369, 9. 704, 14. 282 Hz, which are the same as the measured natural frequen~ cies identified by SFT. It demonstrates that the calculated inter-storey stiffness is accurate. 2.2 DamageScenario To test the identifiability of damages by using only frequencies four damage scenarios are created with inflicted damage at different locations and magnitudes. The damage configurations were introduced by making cuts of 6 cm height and different depth b which depends on the degree of damage severity at the bottom of each column in the first and second stories (see Fig. 1). The dimensions of the cuts were determined by calculating the loss of equivalent inter-storey shear stiffness of each column which represents the damage of the storey in the present study. The four cut configurations respond to four dam1able 1

age scenarios summarized in Table 1, i. e. , 10~ damage in the first storey, 20% damage in the first storey, 20% in the first and 10% in the second storey, 20~ damage in the first and second stories. The theoretical loss of equivalent inter-storey shear stiffness of each column was calculated by using the structural matrix analysis. The design of the cuts corresponding the damage scenarios is not given here due to the limited space. The model in different damage states is tested, the identified natural frequencies and the corresponding differences of frequencies between intact and damaged states are listed in Table 2. 2.3 DamageDetection From Table 2, all the three natural frequencies are identified, however, in reality, the number of measured natural frequencies is always less than that of the unknown stiffness. Thus, in this study, the results for damage identification using only the changes of the first two natural frequencies are obtained and compared with those using all the three natural frequencies for the four damage scenarios. The results for damage identification using only the

7"

450 mm

21,/1"X
Fig. 1

160 mm
-/1

9.5 mm
Configuration of the cut of each column in the first or second floor for modeling damage

Damage scenarios and the corresponding dimensions of cuts b(mm)

Scenario 1 Storey
1

Scenario 2 b 51.30 Storey

l

Scenario 3 b 18.77 Storey

1

Scenario 4 b 37.46 51.30 Storey

1

l)amage/~
--10

I)amage/~ --20

Damage/~ 20 --10

Damage/~ --20 --20

b 37.46 37.46

2
Table 2
mode 1 2

The experimental frequencies (H_z) and the corresponding differences between intact and damaged states

Intact state Fre.

3. 369 9. 704

Damage scenario 1 Fre.

3. 259 9. 485

Damage scenario 2 Fre.

3. 113 9.3(32

Damage scenario 3 Fre.

3. 076 9. 192

Damage scenario 4 Fre.

3. 003 9. 082

Diff. / ~
3.26 --2.25

Diff. / ~
7.60 --4. 1,1

Diff. / ~d
8.70 5.27

Diff. 1/
lO. 86 --6..41

14.282

1,t. 209

0.51

14. 136

--1.02

13.660

--,t.35

i3. 330

6.66

u.jv,~r~w Jou~tof Natuml~ i ~

VoL 1o No.S

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changes of the first two natural frequencies and all the three natural frequencies for the four damage scenarios are shown in Fig. 2, 3, 4, 5, respectively. The measured natural frequencies are noisy-contaminated or may be erroneous, thus, it is not only able to demonstrate the capability of the frequency-based methods to localize and size damages, but it is also able to determine the degree of accuracy of the predictions due to bad estimates of measurement information. The results of comparative study using the two methods are also depicted in Fig. 2, 3,4, 5, respectively. Figures 2 and 3 show the results of damage detection for Scenarios 1 and 2 where only single damage occurs. It can be noted from these figures that the location of damage occurred in the first storey can not only be identified accurately, but also the size of the damage in the first storey can be slightly overestimated. From Fig. 2 it can be seen that one of the other stories besides the first storey in Scenario 1 is identified by mistake as damage by the sensitivity-based method, for example, the second storey using all the three frequencies, the third storey
12 S ".~ ~.. _~] [] Actual [] Neural [] Sensitivity

using the first two frequencies. From Fig. 3 it can be seen that the third storey in Scenario 2 is identified as a damaged storey by mistake using the neural network-based method. However, the degree of accuracy for damage size detection by the two methods is satisfactory, and using only the first two natural frequencies does not take any influence on the degree of accuracy. Figures 4 and 5 show the results of damage identification for the case of multiple damages (Scenarios 3 and 4). Similarly, the first and second stories are accurately identified as the damaged stories by the two methods no matter which natural frequencies are used, and the size of damage in the first and second stories can be detected with a relatively high degree of accuracy by the Neural network-based method. ()bviously, the sensitivity-based method can identify correctly the magnitude of damage in the two scenarios when all the three natural frequencies are used, however, the e r r o r of the damage size detection by the sensitivity-based method is very large. Similarly, the third storey is also considered by mistake as the damage location when all the frequencies are used.
12 I0
ca

(b)

[] Actual

.= 6
O .=

8
e-, O

[] Neural [] Sensitivity

6
4

= 4 "/ 2 2 Number of the storey 3 "

2 I 2 N umber of the storey 3

Fig. 2 Predicted damage of Scenario 1 (a) using all the three natural frequencies, (h) using the first two natural frequencies 3O "g 25 30 [] Actual [] Neural [~ Sensitivity
e-, O ",G

(a)

(b)

25

20 g
"~ 15

2o
J5

[] Actual D Neural [] Sensitivity

g 10 5 1 2 Number of the storey

r,-71___ 3

2 Number of the storey

Fig. 3 Predicted damage of Scenario 2 (a) using all the three natural frequencies, (b) using *he first two natural frequencies

1072

ZHU Ho~pir~ .e~ahD~t~cti= of Structural ~ e :

~r~:

,,

25 20 15

(a)

30 [] Acmat [] Neural [] Sensitivity (I ' 25 ~ Actual [] Neural [] Sensitivity

2o
e-

15

~0

2 Number of the storey

2 Number of the storey

Fig.. 4 Predicted damage of Scenario 3 (a) using all the three natural frequencies, (b) using the first two natural frequencies

30 25

(a)

4O [] Actual gl Neural [] Sensitivity

,3

.~ 3s
30
.~ 25 20

(b)

e,~--x--.]

......
lx\\\l
IN\\\~I

~,~
'

[] Actual [] Nem'al [] Sensitivity

15 ____..>,,3,3

,~ 15 5 0

-i:iN
I

iii t

m
1

2 Number of the storey

2 Number of the storey

Fig. 5 Predicted damage of Scenario 4 (a) using alI the three natural frequencies, (b) using the first two natural frequencies

Conclusion

References
EI~ Capecchi D, Vestroni F. Monitoring of Structural Systems by Using Frequency I)ata. Farthquake Engineering and Structural Dynamics, 1999,28 : 447-461. Cawley P,Adams R D. The Location of Defects in Structures from Measurements of Natural Frequencies. Journal o f Strain Analysis, 1979,14:49-57. Biswas M, Pandey A K, Samman M M. Diagnostic Experimental Spectral/modal Analysis of A Highway Bridge. The International Journal o f Analytical a~M E.rperimental Modal Analysis, 1990, 5:33-42. Zhu H, Wu M. The Characteristic Receptance Method for Damage Detection in Large Mono-Coupled Periodic Structures. Journal o f &rand g~ Vibration, 2002,251(2):241 259. Stubbs N, Broome T H, ()segueda, R. Non-l)estructive Construction Error Detection in I.arge Space Structures. AIAA Journal, 1990,28 .. 146-152. Zhu H, Shima Y. Damage Detection in Structures Using Modified Back Propagation Neural Networks. Acta MECHANI('A SOLIDA Sinica, 2002, 15(4): 358 370. Xu Y 1., Zhan S, Ko J M, et al. Experimental Investigation of Adjacent Buildings Connected by Fluid Damper. Earthquake Engineering and Structural Dynamics, 1999, 28, 609-631.

This paper exploited the possibility to detect the damage of structures by using only the changes of frequency measurements. Two commonly used methods, namely, sensitivity-based method and Neural networkbased method, are adopted to identify the magnitude and location of light and severe damages at one or more sites. Some aspects of damage detection such as the problem of incomplete modal test data and robustness of detection are considered. The results of a laboratory tested three storey steel frame show that the location of damage can be accurately identified by the two methods using 3 or 2 measured natural frequencies but the degree of accuracy for damage size detection depends on the used method. That demonstrates that the accurate damage localization can be realized by using only natural frequencies with a limited amount, and identification of the magnitude of damage can be achieved with a relatively high degree of accuracy if an appropriate method is adopted.

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