Structural health monitoring and finite-element modelling of Suramadu Bridge, Indonesia

Abstract

Structural health monitoring (SHM) has received significant public attention due to its potential to optimise the maintenance, long-term reliability and life-cycle cost of infrastructure systems. The main goal of SHM is to identify, characterise and diagnose anomalous performance of structures. Usually, the most common approach to attain this goal is by investigation of variations in structural natural frequencies. However, both structural degradations and environmental conditions can affect structural performance and, therefore, decoupling natural frequency variations from operational conditions is essential. This paper reports on a monitoring system and measurement data of a long-span cable-stayed in Indonesia (Suramadu Bridge). The main objective of this work was to explore and report the environmental and operational conditions of the bridge for the first time. A detailed finite-element model was developed to investigate the operational performance of the bridge under different environmental conditions. The results showed that the vertical modal properties of the Suramadu Bridge are less affected by ambient excitations in comparison with lateral/torsional modes.