Real-time urban bridge health monitoring using a fixed wireless mesh network

A fixed wireless sensor mesh network for real-time urban bridge health monitoring is presented. This mesh network is consisting of eight identical wireless sensor nodes and one centralized server. Each wireless node is acting as both local client and server with a unique MAC address. The wireless sensor nodes detect and establish wireless communication with neighboring nodes automatically. Real-time accelerometer data was transmitted from each node and collected by a centralized server through multiple hop relays. The accelerometers embedded in the sensor nodes were calibrated to detect the strain of the bridge by using a Vishay^® P3 strain gauge instrument. Several computer software were to be developed to evaluate the structure health of the bridge.