Data Fusion-based Structural Damage Detection Under Varying Temperature Conditions

A huge number of data can be obtained continuously from a number of sensors in long-term structural health monitoring (SHM). Different sets of data measured at different times may lead to inconsistent monitoring results. In addition, structural responses vary with the changing environmental conditions, particularly temperature. The variation in structural responses caused by temperature changes may mask the variation caused by structural damages. Integration and interpretation of various types of data are critical to the effective use of SHM systems for structural condition assessment and damage detection. A data fusion-based damage detection approach under varying temperature conditions is presented. The Bayesian-based damage detection technique, in which both temperature and structural parameters are the variables of the modal properties (frequencies and mode shapes), is developed. Accordingly, the probability density functions of the modal data are derived for damage detection. The damage detection results from each set of modal data and temperature data may be inconsistent because of uncertainties. The Dempster–Shafer (D–S) evidence theory is then employed to integrate the individual damage detection results from the different data sets at different times to obtain a consistent decision. An experiment on a two-story portal frame is conducted to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, with consideration on model uncertainty, measurement noise, and temperature effect. The damage detection results obtained by combining the damage basic probability assignments from each set of test data are more accurate than those obtained from each test data separately. Eliminating the temperature effect on the vibration properties can improve the damage detection accuracy. In particular, the proposed technique can detect even the slightest damage that is not detected by common damage detection methods in which the temperature effect is not eliminated.