An assessment of frequency response curvature methods for damage localization

In structural health monitoring (SHM), the detection of damage in an earlier stage is an important objective in order to reduce or avoid the possibility of structural failure with the resulting costs and/or long periods of interruption of operation. The existing SHM techniques based on the changes of the structural dynamic properties have been recognized, by the research community, as being very useful due to their non-destructive and non-invasive characteristics. Various techniques have been developed and applied in the recent years, the focus of attention being not only the ability to detect damage but also to locate it and quantify its severity by using an indicator. The main objective of this work is to assess the efficiency of Frequency Response Curvature Methods for the localization of damage in early stages. A new approach to minimize the effect of noise, existent in the measured Frequency Response Functions (FRFs) that will be used in these methods, is presented. The case studies are based on numerical simulated data.