Damage localization and severity estimate for three-dimensional frame structures

This paper newly develops a method for the damage localization and severity estimate for three-dimensional frame structures based on the employment of the cross modal strain energy (CMSE). While traditional modal strain energy methods must compare the modal information between the same mode for the baseline (analytical) and damaged (measured) structures, no such constraint is required for the CMSE method. Additionally, the CMSE method does not require the analytical and measured modes to be consistent in scale, or to be normalized. Numerical studies in this paper are conducted for three-dimensional five-story frame structures based on synthetic data generated from finite element models, and excellent results are obtained for both single-damage and multiple-damage scenarios.