Monitoring Bridge Frequencies Using Passing Vehicle

Abstract

In this paper, acceleration responses from a vehicle passing through the bridge are used to monitor the bridge frequencies. A bridge and vehicle system is set up in the laboratory. Sensors are attached to both bridge (direct method) and vehicle (indirect method) to compare the results. The damage is introduced in the bridge to observe the differences in the bridge frequencies between direct and indirect method. The modal analysis method called Covariance-based Stochastic System Identification (SSI) is chosen to analyse the response data. The natural frequencies of both intact and damaged bridge are extracted. Comparing the experimental results between direct and indirect methods shows that using a passing vehicle could identify the bridge frequency.