Robust prognosis of damage involving hysteresis effects in structures with bolted joints

Abstract

Many points are still open in the literature for the Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) in structures assembled by bolted joints. Among them, it stands out obtaining robust metrics that correlate the loss of tightening torque with the variation of the hysteretic damping effects of the structure due to local changes on the friction force between the contact surfaces. It becomes even more challenging when considering indirect vibration measurements in an industrial environment subject to uncertainties and assembly variations. Thus, this project intends to find new metrics based on vibration data and extracted mainly from GP-NARX models that are able to detect, quantify and provide a damage prognosis considering loosening the bolts. (AU)