Cross-modal strain energy method for estimating damage severity

A newly developed damage severity estimation method, termed as cross-modal strain energy (CMSE) method, which is capable of accurately estimating the damage magnitude of multiple damaged members, is presented. While all existing damage severity estimation methods that utilize modal strain energy are either employing an iterative solution procedure or involving significant approximations, the CMSE method is an exact, noniterative solution method. Furthermore, the development of the CMSE method is under the assumption that the mass distributions of the baseline and damaged structures are unknown, but identical. Implementing this method requires only the information of a few modes measured from the damaged structure. Numerical studies are demonstrated for a three-dimensional five-story frame structure based on synthetic data generated from finite element models.