Design of piezoelectric sensor networks for structural monitoring of frame structures

Abstract eng:
In the present paper we study the design of sensor networks for structural monitoring of multi-storey frame structures. We consider each storey of the frame structure to be composed by two flexible sidewalls and one rigid floor. The sensor network is implemented by attaching to the sidewalls piezoelectric patch sensors. The goal is to place the individual patches of the sensor network and to assign weights to them, such that the combined output of the sensor network is a desired structural entity of the frame structure; e.g. the displacement of a specific floor. In the first part we model the flexible sidewalls as Bernoulli-Euler beams and we show that using spatially distributed piezoelectric sensors rather than patch sensors a distribution of the piezoelectric sensors can be easily calculated, which results in the exact measurement of the desired kinematical entity. Based on this exact solution the weights for the sensor network are computed: The piezoelectric patches are placed and weights are assigned based on a static analysis of the structure, in which additional degrees of freedom resulting from the redundancy of the structure are taken into account to optimize the performance of the sensor system. In the second part the analytical solutions are compared to electromechanically coupled three-dimensional Finite Element computations; on the one hand to identify piezoelectric coefficients and permittivities for the analytical model to match the sensing behavior of the Finite Element model, and on the other hand to validate the analytical solution for the sensor network design. The identification of the two material parameters is performed statically for the case of short-circuited electrodes (measuring the electric charge) as well as open electrodes (measuring the voltage). A very good agreement between analytical and numerical results is found.

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