Response of a guyed tower to a guy rupture under no wind pressure

This work investigates the effects of a guy rupture in a guyed tower, on the displacement of the mast, the tensions of the intact guys and on the axial forces in the mast members under no wind pressure. The vibration of the structure is initiated by a load imbalance at the ruptured guy mast attachment node, which is translated into an initial acceleration. The analysis is illustrated with an example guyed tower, the natural frequencies of which were determined for both the intact structure and damaged ones. The time variations of the mast displacements, the guys end tensions and the members axial forces were determined. These results revealed that in addition to the failure of strut members, a set of bracing members had failed and no chord members exceeded its load carrying capacity. The failure of bracing members does not occur when the structure is subjected to a nominal wind speed acting in the plane of the ruptured guy, assumed to be a windward one.