Abstract
An innovative approach for mode shape-informed cable force estimation is proposed. The approach enables avoiding the difficulties in formulating the vibration-based models for cable with elastic end condition or multiple intermediate supports. In addition to using the natural frequencies of the cable, the vibration mode information is introduced to transfer the tied cable with complex boundary condition into an equivalent single-span cable structure positioned between any two vibration stagnation points. Additionally, two rotational springs are introduced at the two ends of the equivalent model. The effects of the rotational spring stiffness, the bending stiffness of the cable, and the wave number between any two zero-amplitude points of the mode on the identification accuracy are analytically studied. The effectiveness of the proposed method is verified by a numerical simulation on a tensile cable with elastic rotational end restraint. The results demonstrate that the proposed method is reliable when the position of the vibration stagnation points is accurately identified.