Structural monitoring and safety assessment during translocation of Mahavira Hall of Jade Buddha Temple

Abstract

The Mahavira Hall of the Jade Buddha Temple in Shanghai, China is a century-old traditional timber structure with a post-and-lintel construction. To improve the temple's architectural layout and enhance the lintel structural integrity, the Mahavira Hall was moved 30.66 m and then elevated 1.05 m in September 2017. To assist in the structural translocation and uplift, the authors designed a monitoring system to continuously measure the relative displacement and inclination of the overall structure, individual components, and inside statues to ensure the integrity of the hall and its contents. This article presents and summarizes the priority issues and principles of monitoring the ancient Chinese timber structure. The time series of monitored data are decimated in order to minimize the fluctuation of data. The structural integrity of the Mahavira Hall was evaluated based on the inclination angle of its vital members. Finally, combined with the limit value regulated by code and the predicted early warning threshold values, which are based on extreme value theory, the effect of the translocation on the structural performance was obtained using fuzzy logic.