Characterization of dynamic coupling induced shifts of frequencies in vehicle-scanning method

A comprehensive strategy combining theory and experiment is proposed to characterize the dynamic coupling induced shifts of vehicle and bridge frequencies through both experimental investigation and numerical validation, in which the effect of vehicle-bridge interaction is theoretically incorporated in the vehicle-scanning method based on the experimental model. It is known that the measurement of bridge frequencies plays an important role in structural health monitoring as the shift of frequency can be served as an indicator of possible damage occurring in a bridge. Nevertheless, the attention has been mainly drawn on the accuracy improvement in developing the vehicle-scanning method so far, with limited discussion of dynamic coupling effect on the frequency shifts. As such, a combined theoretical–experimental approach is presented to show that the influence of vehicle-bridge interaction results in the coupled frequencies of a vehicle-beam system using the vehicle-scanning method, and adopting a heavy lumped test vehicle can lead to the underestimated bridge frequency and overestimated vehicle frequency. As a new finding, the effect of rolling frequency is experimentally observed in the vehicle spectrum for the first time.