Vibration-based damage detection of structures employing Bayesian data fusion coupled with TLBO optimization algorithm

The present paper deals with structural health monitoring of trusses, space frame and plate structure utilizing the Bayesian data fusion approach. The application of the proposed approach has been demonstrated on a 25-member plane truss, a 42-member space frame, a cantilever plate and a 120-member space truss. Different damage indexes of interest have been calculated for the damaged structure utilizing the natural frequency and modeshapes as damage indicators. Damage indexes used are modal strain energy (DIMSE), frequency response function strain energy dissipation ratio (FRFSEDR), flexibility strain energy damage ratio (FSEDR) and residual force-based damage index (RFBDI). Next, the Bayesian data fusion approach has been applied to these four damage indexes to find out the accurate damage location. The proposed approach reduces the number of suspected damaged elements in the structure significantly, thus reducing the computational time of optimization algorithm. Proposed algorithm has also shown encouraging performance in noisy environments. Overall present approach is found to be robust and computationally efficient, and thus can be applied for damage detection involving field evaluation of various structures.