Field measurement and aeroelastic wind tunnel test of wind‐induced vibrations of lattice tower

Abstract

Summary Lattice towers are among the most vulnerable structures during typhoons. In this study, the wind engineering research field base near Shanghai Pudong International Airport was used to measure the mean wind speeds and directions at a height of 10 m, as well as the accelerations atop a 40‐m high lattice tower during Typhoons Neoguri and Nakri to investigate the characteristics of the near‐ground wind and the responses of the lattice tower. Moreover, an aeroelastic model of the lattice tower was generated by the discrete stiffness method. Using the wind tunnel test of the aeroelastic model, the root mean square accelerations of the tower were studied with different wind speeds and directions. The responses of the tower in the across‐wind direction were found always higher than those in the along‐wind direction, which meant the vortex shedding of each single cylinder had an impact on the responses of the tower in the across‐wind direction. The test results were compared with those of field measurements to evaluate the accuracy of the aeroelastic model, and the two were generally in a good agreement. Thus, the aeroelastic model could precisely simulate the dynamic characteristics of a prototypical lattice tower using the discrete stiffness method.