363

Experimental Vibration Analysis for Civil Engineering Structures

Identification of the source, impact and damping of stay-cable

vibrations
A. Larsen & J.E. Andersen
COWI Consulting Engineers, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark

ABSTRACT: Large amplitude cable vibrations were observed on the resund Bridge linking
Denmark and Sweden. Analysis of cable vibration data recorded by the structural monitoring
system of the bridge allowed exclusion of parametric excitation by wind induced oscillation of
the slim towers as source of the large amplitude cable vibrations, leaving wind in combination
with precipitation as the only credible source. This work called for unconventional signal analysis of the vibration data and comparisons with analytical/theoretical models. Also extra measurements of oscillatory strains induced in the outriggers by large amplitude cable vibrations allowed assessment of the fatigue damage sustained. The above work led to a proposal to install
bracings to the outriggers for minimising the risk of fatigue damage and to installation of new
and more robust dampers at the cable anchorages backed by tuned mass dampers on selected
stay cables.
1 INTRODUCTION
The resund Bridge linking Denmark and Sweden is a 490 m main span cable-stayed bridge
carrying road and rail traffic on a two level steel truss girder. One of the design features of the
bridge is the towers which carry no cross beams above the deck, thus appearing as individual
slim columns when viewed from the deck, Figure 1.
The cable stays are arranged in pairs in a harp fashion inclined in parallel at an angle of 300
with horizontal. The cables are anchored to the girder on outriggers with the same inclination as
the stay cables and the truss diagonals and along the slim tower legs. The stay cables are
equipped with 2mm helical fillets for mitigation of rain/wind vibrations.
10
Cable Stay Numbering

08
06

09
07
05

Figure 1. resund Cable Stayed Bridge linking Denmark and Sweden. Stay cables are numbered according to their position in the respective harps. Stay no. 10 being the longest, 9 the next longest, etc.

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In early spring 2000, during the final stages of completion, a number of large amplitude cable
stay vibration incidents were reported by workers on the bridge. These observations resulted in
a decision to install hydraulic dampers at the lower anchorages of the longest stays in each harp
to further safeguard the bridge against large amplitude cable vibrations which could cause fatigue in the outriggers as well as being of concern to the public travelling on the bridge. The hydraulic IHD dampers installed, featured an oil filled hose inserted between the stay cable and
guide tube 3.8 m above the anchorage. Large stay cable vibrations were not observed for 1
year until the permanent Structural Monitoring System (SMS) on the bridge picked up a large
amplitude incident in December 2001 which was followed by more incidents in early spring
2002.
An inspection of the dampers revealed severe mechanical damages indicating that the damper
design applied was inadequate for the bridge. An engineering task group involving representatives from the owner, the contractor and the designer was then formed to clarify the cable vibration excitation mechanism, assess the fatigue damage sustained by the outriggers and propose
measures which would minimise the risk of future large amplitude cable vibrations and associated fatigue damage.
2 ASSESSMENT OF STAY EXCITAION MECHANISM
The first action of the engineering task group was to establish the source of the large cable oscillations. This is vital in order to choose the proper design measure for mitigation of the vibrations. As an example, dampers fitted to the cable stays will be efficient if the oscillations were
due to forces acting on the stays them selves. If on the other hand, excitation of the cable stays
were proven to be caused by vibrations of the deck or tower structures, damping of the stays
would be of little or no use. In an attempt to arrive at some understanding of the excitation
mechanism, a catalogue of incidents and corresponding weather conditions observed by personnel on the bridge or later recorded by accelerometers forming a part of the bridges permanent
structural monitoring system and located on selected stay cables during the time interval January 2000 to March 2002 was compiled and is reproduced in Table 1.
Table 1. Overview of large peak amplitudes at cable middle, January 2000 to March 2002.
Date of event Stay nos. *)
21.jan.2000
4.feb.2000
24.feb.2000
6.mar.2000
13.apr.2001

Vertical

Horizontal

Temp

Wind
Speed
15 - 20 m/s
12 m/s
14 - 16 m/s
16 - 18 m/s
16 m/s

Wind
Dir.
NNW
NNW
SSE
SWW
N

Precipit.
Snow
Rain
Rain
Rain
Light
Rain
Rain

6-10 All fans

1.0 m - 1.5 m
-1 C
6-10 All fans 0.5 m - 1.0 m
3 C
9 WSSS
0.8 m - 1.0 m
5 C
10 WMSS
0.5 m - 0.8 m
4 C
10 ESSN
1.8 m
1.5 C
10 EMSS
0.5 m
21.dec.2001 10 ESSN
2.0 m - 2.2 m
1.0 m - 3.0 m
0.7 C
19 m/s
WSW
9 EMSS
1.0 m - 1.5 m
24.dec.2001 8-10 ESSN
0.6 m - 1.1 m
0.6 m - 1.1 m
0 C
12 m/s
SW
Snow
8 ESSN
3.0 m
0.5 m - 3.0 m
8-9 EMSS
0.5 m - 1.1 m
15.feb.2002
7 WMSS
0.3 m - 0.4 m
4 C
10 m/s
W
[Dry]
19.feb.2002
5-10 ESSN
1.0 m - 2.0 m
1.0 m - 2.0 m
-0.5 C 22 m/s
N
Rain
5-10 WMSN 1.0 m - 2.0 m
1.0 m - 2.0 m
5-10 WMSS 1.0 m - 2.0 m
1.0 m - 2.0 m
22.feb.2002
5-10 WMSS 1.0 m - 2.0 m
1.0 m - 2.0 m
-0.5 C 16-22 m/s
SSW Snow
26.feb.2002
10 ESSN
0.6 m
4 C
15 m/s
SW
Rain
6.mar.2002
10 ESSN
1.0 m
3 C
15/18 m/s
SW
Rain
8 ESSN
0.7 m
10 EMSS
0.9 m
*) Cable stays are numbered according to location in the respective harps, i.e.: ESSN = East Side Span
North, stay 10 being the longest, stay 9 second longest, stay 8 third longest, etc. See also Figure 1.

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Experimental Vibration Analysis for Civil Engineering Structures

From Table 1 it is noted that most of the incidents occurred at air temperatures close to 00 C,
at relatively high winds and in presence of precipitation in form of rain or snow. This observation pointed to rain/wind or galloping caused by snow accumulation on the stays them selves to
be the cause of the large amplitude stay oscillations. However, the incident at 24.dec.2001 displaying amplitudes as large as 3.0 m for stay no. 8 at a frequency of 0.576 Hz was speculated to
be due to parametric excitation by the second order bending mode of the tower. Indeed observing the spectra of the vertical stay and longitudinal tower motions, Figure 2, it is noted that the
tower spectrum (dashed) displays a strong peak at twice the basic stay frequency of 0.576 Hz.
24th December 2001 04:55:53
ESSN Stay 8 Z
Tow er EN X

Magnitude [m2/Hz]

10

-5

10

-10

10

0.5

1.5

2
Frequency [Hz]

2.5

3.5

Figure 2 . Measured vertical displacement spectra of stay 8 (full) and longitudinal displacement of tower
top (dashed)

Resonant excitation of one structural member (cable) by another (tower or deck) can usually
be detected as a phase lag between the driving and the driven member. Such phase measurement
are straight forward if the frequencies of the two members are identical and is obtained from
cross spectra of vibration signals measured on the two members in question. If the frequency of
the driving member is twice that of the driven member, as in the case of parametric excitation,
the phase lag can not be found from the cross spectrum.

= -30
0
Stay displacement

-1
-1

= -15
0
Stay displacement

= 15
0
Stay displacement

= 0
0
Stay displacement

Stay
Tower

-1
-1

-1
-1

Tower displacement

Tower displacement

-1
-1

Displacement

-1
-1

Tower displacement

Tower displacement

Tower displacement

= 30
0
Stay displacement

-1
1

= 15
2
3
Time [s]

Figure 3 . Model Lissajou figure of basic (stay) and frequency (tower) harmonic signals for phase shifts
of -300, -150 and 00 (top row) and +150, +300 (bottom row).

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An alternative method for determination of the phase is by plotting the harmonic displacement of the double frequency (tower) against the displacement of the basic frequency (stay) as
is done in the model in Figure 3. In case the two elements displacements are exactly in phase (
= 0), the resulting Lissajou figure forms a perfect figure , top row, right. If the double frequency motion (tower) is leading or driving the basic frequency motion ( negative) the figure
deforms upwards (top row), but if the basic frequency is leading or driving the double frequency motion, the figure deforms downwards (bottom row).
Taking now the longitudinal tower displacement signal and vertical stay signal recorded during the large amplitude incident on 24.dec.2001, the time traces and Lissajou figure shown in
Figure 4 is obtained. It is noted that Lissajou figure (right) shows a strong resemblance to the
model signal in Figure 3 for which = +300, baring strong evidence that the stay cable is leading the tower motion. Thus this incident can be dismissed as a case of parametric excitation.
4

ESSN Stay 8 Z

Tower ENX (Scaled)

Displacement [m]

Tow er EN X (Scaled)

-4
30

32

34

36
Time [s]

38

40

-1
-1

0
ESSN Stay 8 (Scaled)

Figure 4 . Excerpt of time series and Lissajou figure for tower stay oscillations recorded on 24. Dec. 2001,
displaying a 30 deg. phase lag of the tower motion relative to the stay motion.

The physics behind the behavior of the stay/tower motions measured during the incident
24.dec.2001 is easily understood from the sketch in Figure 5. Every time the stay reaches maximum amplitude of the upward or downward motion, the tower top is deflected in the direction
of the stay thus moving at double frequency of the stay which drives the motion. Due to the inertia and damping, the deflection of the tower will lag the deflection of the stay.

Figure 5 . Sketch demonstrating the physics leading to doubling of the stay frequency motion when transferred into the tower motion.

With the above evidence in mind the engineering task force concluded that the large amplitude stay oscillations observed were all likely caused by rain/wind action or galloping caused by
snow or ice aggregation on the stays. Mitigation could thus be effectuated by adding damping to
the stays, although a more efficient and durable damper than the IHD design had to be devised.

Experimental Vibration Analysis for Civil Engineering Structures

367

In the summer of 2002 the broken dampers were replaced by new similar IHD dampers to safeguard the bridge temporarily while a more efficient damper system was being developed. One
of the stays 9 EMSS (East Mid Span South) was equipped with a double IHD damper in an attempt to increase the damping level and cable stays 10 EMSS and 8 ESSN were quipped with a
newly developed hydraulic IRD damper comprising three hydraulic pistons mounted radially
between the stay and the guide tube 4.6 m above the anchorage at 120 deg. intervals. A more efficient and durable damper design than the original IHD damper.
Structural monitoring of the cable stays continued and in December 2003 new large amplitude cable vibrations were observed and monitored, followed by several incidents in the winter
2004. These incidents were all well documented through the monitoring system and provided
basis for carrying out further analysis of the cable vibration excitation mechanism.
All available vibration records obtained by the monitoring system in the winter 2003/2004
were post processed and analysed. The objective of this processing was to single out physical
vibration events from noise and further to convert acceleration amplitudes (m/s2) to displacement amplitudes (m). The following procedure was applied:
A total of 5 large amplitude events were detected which displayed amplitudes larger than approximately L/500. The corresponding dates, stay nos., duration (min.) amplitude ranges (m)
and axes involved are listed in table 2.
Table 2. Overview of large peak amplitudes at cable middle, December 2003 to February 2004.
Date of event Stay nos.
Vertical
Horizontal Temp
Wind
Wind Precipitation
Speed
Dir.
22 Dec 2003 8-10 EMSS
1.5 - 2.7 m
-0.3 C 16 m/s
N
Snow / sleet
3-10 ESSN
0.8 - 3.5 m
0.5 m
19 Jan 2004
8-9 EMSS
0.8 - 1.0 m
0.0 C
16 m/s
SW
Ice slush
3-4 ESSN
1.0 - 1.3 m
10 ESSN
2.5 - 3.0 m
30 Jan 2004
8 EMSS
1.0 m
0.5 m
-2 C
10 m/s
S
Snow
9 ESSN
1.0 - 1.5 m
0.5 m
10 ESSN
3.0 m
1.0 m
1 Feb 2004
8 EMSS
0.8 m
0.2 m
5 C
16 m/s
SSW Rain
9 ESSN
1.5 - 1.0 m
0.5 m
10 ESSN
0.5 m
0.1 m
24 Feb 2004 7 ESSN
2.0 m
0.5 m
0 C
14 m/s
SW
Rain
9 EMSS
1.0 m
0.3 m
10 ESSN
3.0 m
1.0 m
10 EMSS
0.5 m
0.1 m

The data shown in Table 2 corroborates the conclusion reached by the engineering task group
that stay cable excitation is due to the combination of high wind speeds, low air temperatures
and precipitation. The incident of 24.Feb.2004, for which a detailed account of the weather parameters at the near by Copenhagen Kastrup Airport meteorological station is available, is particularly illustrative. Figure 6 left displays the displacement envelopes of stays 10 EMSS (top)
and 10 ESSN (bottom). It is noted that stay vibrations starts at approximately 12:30 hrs and dies
down at 13:30 hrs. Stay 10 EMSS equipped with the new IRD damper reaches maximum amplitudes of approximately 0.5 m where as the amplitude of stay 10 ESSN which was equipped with
an old IHD damper which was found to be broken, reaches amplitudes of 3.0 m. This proves the
efficiency of the new IRD damper over the old IHD design. The weather parameters, Figure 6
right, are very revealing and correlate very well with the stay oscillations. At 9:00 hrs, the air
temperature is sub-zero, the wind speed 10 m/s and the humidity 82%. Over the morning the air
temperature, wind speed and air humidity increases slowly as a snow squall approaches from
SW. At approximately 12:30 hrs the snow squall hits Kastrup Airport and the bridge with wind
speeds close to 14 m/s and with precipitation in form of snow and sleet. The interpretation of the
incident is that snow and sleet accumulation on the surface of the stays which is likely cooler
than the air temperature. The snow accumulation changes the cross section of the stays and
causes galloping at high wind speeds.

10ESSN-Z [m]

10ESSN-Y [m]

10EMSS-Z [m]

10EMSS-Y [m]

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EVACES07

3
2

IRD damper, = 4.5%

1
0
3
2
1
0
3
2

IHD, broken, = 0.8%

1
0
3
2
1

0
04-02-24 12:00:00

2004-02-24 12:30:00

2004-02-24 13:00:00
Time

2004-02-24 13:30:00

2004-02-24 14

Figure 6 . Vertical (y) and horizontal vibration displacement envelopes f stay no. 10 EMSS equipped with
the new IRD and vertical and horizontal displacements of cable stay no. 10 ESSN equipped with a broken
IHD damper. Right: Wind speed, air temperature and relative humidity measured at nearby Copenhagen
Kastrup Airport.

Figure 7 . Excerpt from video recording of stay cable no. 10 ESSN displaying 3 m vertical amplitudes.
The dashed white line marks a straight line from lower to upper stay cable anchorage.

3 FATIGUE LIFE ASSESSEMNT

Large amplitude stay oscillations may cause adverse comments form users of the bridge, but
more important, due to the particular design concept of connecting the stay cables to outriggers
extending from the stiffening truss, the connection between the outrigger and top chord may
suffer fatigue damage. The principle being that vertical stay oscillations are transferred into out
of plane bending oscillations of the outrigger frame which in turn will introduce bending
stresses in the top chord as illustrated in Figure 8.
In order to evaluate the possible fatigue damage suffered by the bridge a fatigue damage assessment was carried out following the code based on ASTM E-1049 - Standard Practices for
Cycle Counting in Fatigue Analysis. The Miners number is used to describe the fatigue level of
the outriggers and is determined using Rainflow Counting and the appropriate SN-curve. The
outriggers are designed according to Eurocode class 63.
Only large amplitude stay oscillations in the vertical plane, is of importance for the assessment of fatigue life of the outriggers. Both amplitude stay oscillations in the z and y-direction
are of importance for the assessment of fatigue life for the cables. However it has been assessed
that the outrigger would be more exposed than the cable socket, thus only vertical oscillations
was considered in the fatigue analysis of the outriggers.

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Experimental Vibration Analysis for Civil Engineering Structures

Tubular
Bracing

Figure 8 . Left: Principle for transfer of cable oscillations to a bending moment at the outrigger root/top
chord connection weld. Right: Bracing installed to prevent outrigger fatigue.

At cable stay 08 ESSN both an accelerometer and strain gauges was installed and had monitored the same events. This gave the possibility to also carry out fatigue analysis at those outriggers were only accelerometers were installed at the stay cables. Based on the measurements a
transfer function from cable deflections to stress at the root of the upper cord for the outrigger
was calculated before and after the extra bracings was installed. At the eigenfrequency the acceleration to stress ratio was calculated to 4.4 MPa/m/s2 before installation of bracing and 1.1
MPa/m/s2 after installation of bracings. The transfer function was calculated based on events
with large amplitudes, as these would be the only events contributing to fatigue above the cut
off limit at 26 MPa. As the cable attack angle to the outrigger is a function of cable length and
amplitude the new transfer function taking the variation of cable stay length into account can be
expressed as follows:
f , x (t ) = K

Lx
K = 4,4 MPa / m / s without bracings
Ax (t )
L8
K = 1,1MPa / m / s with bracings

(1)

Where K is the transfer function measured at cable stay 08 ESSN, L8 is the length of cable stay
no. 08, Lx is the length of the investigated cable stay no. 03 - 10 and Ax is the acceleration time
history measured at the investigated cable stay
Using this transfer function, rainflow counting was done on all acquired acceleration time series converted to stress levels to determine the number of stress cycles for 500 discrete stress
levels (si,ni, i=500). Table 3 shows the calculated Miners no for the outriggers 10 EMSS - 03
EMSS and 03ESSN - 10 ESSN.
Table 3. Fatigue calculation and rest life time assessment for cable stays 03 EMSS to 10 EMSS and 03
ESSN to 10 ESSN in vertical direction.
Cable
Miners
Damage
Damage
Stay
Miners
Damage
Damage
Stay
No.
in % of
in % of
Cable
No.
in % of
in % of
*ChFL
**DsFL
*ChFL
**DsFL
03 EMSS
1,42E-04
0,0%
0,3%
03 ESSN
2,56E-03
0,3%
3,0%
04 EMSS
7,37E-05
0,0%
0,2%
04 ESSN
3,41E-03
0,3%
4,2%
05 EMSS
2,60E-05
0,0%
0,1%
05 ESSN
9,82E-06
0,0%
0,0%
06 EMSS
2,63E-04
0,0%
0,4%
06 ESSN
1,92E-03
0,2%
2,3%
07 EMSS
2,45E-06
0,0%
0,0%
07 ESSN
1,66E-05
0,0%
0,0%
08 EMSS
1,72E-04
0,0%
0,3%
08 ESSN
3,03E-08
0,0%
0,0%
09 EMSS
9,13E-04
0,1%
2,6%
09 ESSN
2,50E-04
0,0%
0,3%
10 EMSS
9,80E-06
0,0%
0,0%
10 ESSN
9,26E-05
0,0%
0,2%
*ChFL = Characteristic Fatigue Life. **DsFL = Design Fatigue Life

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Table 3 shows that the outriggers at cable stays no 03 EMSS, 03 ESSN, 04 ESSN, 06 ESSN
and 09 EMMS may have a structural problem in achieving the 100 year design life time. The table show that up to 4.2% of the design capacity for the joint between the upper chord and the
girder has been utilized for cable stay no 04 ESSN over a period of 2 years. It is important to
note that the period 1st January 2003 to 1st March 2003 is missing in the calculations because the
structural monitoring system was not operating during this period.
Table 3 also shows that when installing bracings at cable stays 7 to 10 to support the outriggers, no fatigue problems occur, even though the cable at the outrigger has been exposed to amplitudes up to 3.5 m. The table gives an indication that structural problems can be avoided by
installing bracings for specific outriggers, even though the dampers for long period's mal function.
Based on the recommendations of the task group support bracings were installed on all outriggers at cable stays 7 - 10 to prevent fatigue of the outriggers at the root welding of the upper
cord, Figure 8 and Figure 9. Furthermore the SMS was upgraded by a strain gauge monitoring
system monitoring the applied fatigue at the root of the outrigger in real time by carrying out
rain flow counting on the monitored stress cycles. Also when triggered the SMS recorded cable
vibrations on digital video.

Bracing

Figure 9 . Left: Stay Cable outriggers before installation of bracings to prevent fatigue loading. Right:
Stay cable outriggers after installation of bracings which prevent out of plane bending of the outriggers.

4 CABLE DAMPING CAPASITY

Having solved the structural fatigue problem by adding bracings to the most exposed outriggers
it was decided to upgrade the stay damping system to a level capable of handling weather conditions similar to those encountered on 24.Feb.2004. A key step of this task was to arrive at a design value for excitation of the cables.
Guidelines for cable oscillations available in codes of practice, such as EUROCODE ENV
1991-2-4: 1995, are often based on a 1 DOF linear oscillator model, which predicts incipient
galloping when the aerodynamic excitation represented by the constant aG balances the energy
dissipation by structural modal damping represented by . By equating the excitation and damping terms, the following expression for the galloping wind speed VG can be obtained as:
VG =

4m f
aG D

(2)

Where : Structural damping, log. dec. f: Structural eigenfrequency. aG : A constant representing the strength of the aerodynamic excitation. : Air density. V: Wind speed. D: Characteristic
crosswind dimension of structure (cable diameter) and m: Structural mass / unit length.

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371

EUROCODE ENV 1991-2-4: 1995 specifies aG = 1.0 for ice aggregation on cables and inserting in (1) the relevant cable parameters listed in Table 4, a galloping wind speed VG = 4.7
m/s for cable stay 10 ESSN carrying the broken IHD dampers and VG = 26.5 m/s for cable stay
10 EMSS carrying the intact IRD dampers is obtained. With reference to Figure 6, the linear
galloping model of EUROCODE ENV 1991-2-4 is not adequate as it fails to predict the incipient galloping wind speed for 10 EMSS and further the linear oscillator model does not allow for
finite amplitudes. In order to remedy this situation, a non-linear oscillator model was introduced
in which the aerodynamic damping becomes a function of the oscillation amplitude raised to the
power , Larsen & Lafrnire (2005). This non-linear 1DOF differential equation is solved analytically assuming slowly varying amplitudes to yield the following expression for cable stay
galloping amplitude yG:
1

4m f

y G = Y0 1
a G VD

(3)

In (3) Y0, aG and are constants to be determined form experiment for which the galloping
incident of 24 February 2004 provided the ideal dataset for.
Assuming in a first iteration that = 1 and that the aerodynamic excitation is equal for 10
EMSS and 10 ESSN, numerical values for aG and Y0 can be found with the yG and listed in Table 4, yielding aG = 2.3 and Y0 = 3.5 m. The exponent can be determined in a second iteration as
= 0.3 by fitting the time wise development of the galloping amplitude for 10 ESSN to the envelope solution for the non-linear differential equation, Larsen & Lafrnire (2005). It is noted
that aG determined this way is 2.3 times higher than aG = 1.0 given in EUROCODE ENV 19912-4 for cable galloping due to ice aggregation.
Having determined the galloping parameter aG corresponding to the ice/wind loading of 24
Feb. 2004, it is now possible to back calculate from (3) the modal cable damping capacity necessary to avoid incipient galloping at wind speeds lower than 25 m/s for the cable stays of the
bridge. As an example = 9.8% is obtained for cable stays 10.
Table 4. Properties of cable stays 10 EMSS and 10 ESSN used for parameter estimation in equation (2)
Mass m Diameter D Frequency f
Air density Wind Speed V Damping
Amplitude yG
96 kg/m
0.25 m
0.48 Hz
1.25 kg/m3
14 m/s
ESSN: 0.8%
3.0 m
EMSS: 4.5% 0.5 m

Modal damping, log. dec.

0.08

Mode 3 Mode 2

Mode 1

0.06

0.04

0.02

0
0

5
5
2 .10
4 .10
Damping coefficient C [Ns/m]

6 .10

Figure 10. Left: Taut string theory identifying maximum obtainable damping level for viscous dampers
located close to the anchorage. Right: Tuned Mass Damper assembly for provision of additional damping.
Trial mounting of a TMD on cable stay 9 ESSN.

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DESIGN OF STAY CABLE DAMPING DEVICES

Having established the necessary modal damping levels for securing the cable stays against
ice/wind galloping the task at hand was to identify suitable devices that would meet those requirements. For cable stays 10, the 4.5% damping secured by the IRD dampers should be
boosted by approximately 5% to reach the target level determined above.
Taut string theory, as presented in Larsen & Vejrum (2006), is helpful for determining the
maximum modal damping obtainable and the corresponding viscous damping coefficient C for a
stay cable with a damping device mounted close to one anchorage. From Figure 10 left, it is
noted that the maximum modal damping obtainable for stay cables 10 is about 5.5%, which for
the first mode corresponds to a damping coefficient C 450 kN/ms-1. The necessary additional
damping was provided by mounting a tuned mass damper unit comprising two spring/mass systems embedded in separate canisters at the lower 1/3 point of the stay cables, Figure 10 right.
6 CONCLUSION
Large cable vibration events registered by the structural monitoring system on the resund
Bridge have been analysed in order to determine vibration patterns, assessing physical mechanisms starting cable vibrations and obtaining an estimate for possible fatigue damage in the joint
between the upper chord and the outrigger.
The present analysis has revealed up to 3.5 m vibration amplitudes of long cable stays and
vibrations above 1.2 m for short cable stays. At all these cables the large vibrations due to
ice/wind galloping, caused the original IHD dampers to break down.
Based on these observations it is assessed that the dampers are not efficient in case of ice
build up on the cables due to glazing or accumulation snow.
The damper design with double IHD used at 9 EMSS has showed to be some-what better than
the old IHD design. However, the double installation did not prevent the dampers from being
damaged at large vibrations.
The IRD damper at cable stay 8 ESSN and 10 EMSS seems to provide better damping than
the IHD dampers, however large vibrations still occur, but for shorter time than with IHD
dampers. The advantage compared to the normal IHD damper is also that the dampers due not
suffer break down due to large vibration incidents.
Applying rainflow counting to all recorded event files to carry out fatigue calculations it has
be revealed that only the outriggers at cable stays no 03 EMSS and 04 ESSN may have a structural problem in succeeding a 100 year life time. The tables show that when installing bracings
as at cable stays 7 to 10, to support the outriggers, no fatigue problems occur within at 100 year
life time, even though the cable at the outrigger has been exposed to amplitudes up to 3.5 m. As
a consequence of these calculations all outriggers at the bridge has now been equipped with additional bracings.
Based on the data analysis a criterion for the necessary damping capacity to prevent galloping
was established. Taut string calculations for viscous dampers located close to the cable anchorages revealed that the maximum obtainable damping was not sufficient to secure the longest cable stays against ice/wind galloping. A new damping concept using TMD dampers mounted on
the cables as supplement to the viscous dampers were devised and is currently being tested.
7 REFERENCES
Larsen, A., Lafrnire, A. 2005: Application of a limit cycle oscillator model to bridge cable galloping.
Proc. of Sixth International Symposium on Cable Dynamics. 19-22 September, Charleston, USA.
Larsen, A., Vejrum, T. 2006: Design of dampers for mitigation of stay cable vibrations. Proc. of International Conference on Bridge Engineering. 1-3 November, Hong Kong, SAR China.