Aeroelastic boundary layer tests of a 1:76 model of tall building and effects of adjacent building interference

Abstract

With the continuous emergence of high-rise structures globally, there is a growing concern regarding the impact of wind on these wind-sensitive buildings. Consequently, the objective of this study is to examine the performance of a large-scale aeroelastic model of a high-rise building by conducting wind tunnel tests at a geometric scale of 1:76. Furthermore, the effects of upstream interference and transient wind speed were studied to represent the real turbulent wind regime in urban landscapes. The results are reported in both time-domain and frequency-domain to reveal the response characteristics. A comprehensive study of the large-aeroelastic responses in terms of rms of accelerations, power spectral density, base shear forces, and base moment were investigated. The results demonstrated that the across-wind responses were higher than along-wind responses in all the situation of wind speed and directions. Also, the presence of the upstream building significantly amplifies the across-wind and torsional response of the aeroelastic model but has only a minor effect on the model's along-wind response. The study's results can be used to evaluate numerical simulation for calculating a tall building's wind-induced vibration, as well as finally be utilized to produce guidelines for minimizing wind-related damage and occupant discomfort caused by high vibration.