Localization of breathing cracks in engineering structures with transmissibility function-based features

Structures such as fuselage, blade and wing in aeronautical and astronautical engineering are often subjected to cyclic loads in their service life, which in turn causes breathing cracks in these structures. To provide much more precise position of breathing cracks in structures and avoid structure failure, a local vibration-based approach using transmissibility function-based features is proposed and verified in this study. In the new method, nonlinear dynamic behaviour of cracked structures is simulated by a chain-type multiple-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) model, in which breathing cracks are represented as related nonlinear connections between masses. By modifying local structural physical parameters (mass, stiffness or damping coefficient), transmissibility function-based features are derived from cracked structures only and corresponding damage indicator is calculated for fault localization. Based on results of simulations on the chain-type model with breathing cracks, the effectiveness and practicability of damage indicator and method are verified and demonstrated. Moreover, merits, drawbacks and further development of this method are summarized and discussed.