Damage detection in plate structures based on space-time autoregressive moving average processes

Abstract

This paper presents a method for damage detection in plate structures based on space-time series analysis. The plate is divided into several spatial sub-regions and a space-time autoregressive moving average process (STARMA) is identified with the vibration responses of certain sub-region. And then the responses of other sub-regions are predicted with the identified model. The predicted errors are used as the criterion to detect and locate the damage by comparing the predicted responses with the practical ones. The validity of the methodology is demonstrated by a numerical model of a cantilever plate with cracks. The results show that this method can effectively detect the location and the size of the cracks even in the absence of the prior knowledge about the undamaged structure. © 2011 Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.