Human-induced vibration serviceability of arch pre-stressed concrete truss system

Human-induced vibration has become a serious serviceability problem due to the larger opening of girder, lighter floor systems and longer spans designed and used in practice. Vibration tests were undertaken in laboratory to research the vibrational characteristics of the arch pre-stressed concrete truss (APT) system spanning 16.0 m. Results from ambient vibration, impulse excitations (heel-drop and jumping) and steady-state incentives (walking and running) were presented. Dynamic characteristics such as natural frequencies, damping ratios, mode shapes and acceleration responses were studied and checked against the existing codes. Experimental results show that the investigated APT girder possesses high fundamental frequency and low damping ratio. Moreover, the perception factors based on the root-mean-square acceleration, vibration dose value (VDV) and psychological comfort data were obtained. Lastly, the threshold accelerations and VDVs were suggested for evaluating the human-induced vibration.