A Distributed Computing Platform for Conventional Hybrid Simulation

Abstract

This paper describes the development of a distributed computing platform that supports general-purpose quasi-static structural testing, including conventional hybrid simulation. It depicts the design of this platform, including the assignment of the responsibilities of the participating software components, the communication protocols by which the software components communicate across the networks. In this study, the finite element analysis program "Platform of Inelastic Structural Analysis for 3D systems" (PISA3D) was chosen as the analysis kernel. The required programming augmentation of PISA3D to support geographically distributed hybrid simulation in a general-purpose manner is given. Using the proposed platform, a series of conventional hybrid tests was conducted on a specimen of steel panel damper (SPD) by employing a multi-axial testing system. The prototype building is a threedimensional six-story moment resisting frame with four SPDs incorporated in each story as the main seismic resisting system. During the tests an online model updating (OMU) technique was employed to dynamically update the material properties of other relevant numerical SPD elements to enhance the fidelity of the structural model. Test results proved the validity and the high flexibility of the proposed platform.