Developing a Benchmark Study for Structural Health Monitoring

The development of a methodology for accurate and reliable condition assessment of civil struc-tures has become very important. The finite element (FE) model updating method provides an efficient, non-destructive, global damage identification technique, which is based on the fact that the modal parameters (e.g. natural frequencies and mode shapes) of the structure are af-fected by structural damage. In the FE model, the damage is represented by a change of the structural parameters and can be identified by updating the FE model to the measured modal parameters. This thesis describes an iterative sensitivity-based FE model updating method in which the discrepancies between the natural frequencies of the numerical model and the real structure are minimized. Furthermore, the updating procedure is applied to the model of the University of the Federal Armed Forces (UniBw) in Munich. For this purpose, it was necessary to design the model and develop an interface between the finite element software (ANSYS) and a computing software (MATLAB), which can apply the model updating technique to the finite element model.