An improved numerical-experimental method for damage location in structures

Abstract

An improvement of a curvature based numerical-experimental method for damage location in structures [1] is presented. The Mach-Zehnder shearography interferometer is used to measure the rotations field or the out-of-plane first order derivatives of mode shapes displacement field [2, 3]. The curvatures or second order derivatives are computed by a numerical method [4]. An aluminum beam with two small transversal cuts was tested for damaged location. The experimental results show a high correlation between the curvatures discontinuities field and the damages position. This study also demonstrates the superior performance of the curvature method using measured rotations field instead of measured displacements field.