A simplified method for estimating fundamental periods of pylons in overhead electricity transmission systems

In seismic design of a pylon supporting transmission lines in an overhead electricity transmission system, an estimation of the fundamental periods of the pylon in two orthogonal vertical planes is necessary to compute the seismic forces required for sizing pylon members and checking pylon deflections. In current practice, the fundamental periods of a pylon in two orthogonal vertical planes are typically obtained from eigenvalue analyses of a model consisting of the pylon of interest as well as some adjacent pylons and the transmission lines supported by these pylons. Such an approach is onerous and numerically inconvenient. This research focused on development of a simplified method to determine the fundamental periods of pylons. The simplified method is rooted in Rayleigh's quotient and is based on a single-pylon model. The force vectors that can be used to generate the shape vectors required in Rayleigh's quotient are presented in detail. Taking three pylons selected from representative overhead electricity transmission systems having different design parameters as examples, the fundamental periods of the chosen pylons predicted from the simplified method were compared with those from the rigorous eigenvalue analyses. Result comparisons show that the simplified method provides reasonable predictions and it can be used as a convenient surrogate for the tedious approach currently adopted.