Maia N., Almeida R., Urgueira A.

The identification of the rigid body properties of a structure is an important matter in various structural dynamic applications, namely in structural modification (coupling/uncoupling), optimisation, vibration control, etc. In most situations, the only way to go is through experimental measurements, i.e., through an inverse process where from the frequency response functions (FRFs) one estimates the desired properties. The objective of the present article is the evaluation and comparison of the performance of two different kind of identification methods that use receptance FRFs as inputs, although in different manners; in one of them the properties are evaluated directly from the measurement data – direct methods – whereas the other type involves a modal identification procedure as an intermediate step – modal methods. A car wheel is the chosen real example to illustrate the performance of both techniques.