Structural damage detection accounting for loss of data in wireless network sensors

Abstract

For detection of damage in frame and truss structures, the normalized cumulative energy is proposed as the identification parameter within the framework of the damage locating vector (DLV) method. Due to the limited number of sensors used, it is necessary to filter out the actual damaged elements from the identified set of potential damaged elements. An intersection scheme using only the measured signals is proposed for the filtering and verified using a warehouse frame comprising truss, beam and column elements. As wireless sensors are introduced into structural health monitoring systems, loss of data during transmission is one significant issue which needs to be addressed. An algorithm to patch the loss data is proposed and when integrated with the proposed damage detection method is experimentally shown to be feasible using a cantilever truss.