Research on Moving Force Estimation of the Bridge Structure using the Adaptive Input Estimation Method

An on-line adaptive input estimation method that estimates the moving force inputs of the bridge structure is presented in this research. By using the inverse method, input forces acting on bridge structural system can be estimated from the measured dynamic responses. The algorithm includes the Kalman filter (KF) and the recursive least squares estimator (RLSE). This work presents an efficient weighting factor r of the RLSE, which is capable of improving the estimation results. The capability of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated through several examples of the bridge structure system with different types of the time-varying moving forces as the unknown inputs.