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Smart Structures and Systems
  Volume 26, Number 5, November 2020 , pages 619-629
DOI: https://doi.org/10.12989/sss.2020.26.5.619
 


Mitigation of wind-induced responses of cylinder solar tower by a tiny eddy current tuned mass damper based on elastic wind tunnel tests
Min Liu, Shouying Li and Zhengqing Chen

 
Abstract
    Solar towers, which often has a large aspect ratio and low fundamental natural frequency, were extremely prone to large amplitude of wind-induced vibrations, especially Vortex-Induced Vibration (VIV). A tiny Tuned Mass Damper (TMD) with conveniently adjustable eddy current damping was specially designed and manufactured for elastic wind tunnel tests of a solar tower. A series of numerical simulations by using the COMSOL software were conducted to determine three key parameters, including the thickness of the back iron plate and the conductive plate (Tb and Tc), the distance between the magnet and the conductive plate (Td). Based on the results of numerical simulations, a tiny TMD was manufactured and its structural parameters were experimentally identified. The optimized values of the tiny TMD can be conveniently realized. The tiny TMD was installed at the top of the elastic test model of a 243-meter-high solar tower, and a series of wind tunnel tests were carried out to examine the effectiveness of the TMD in suppressing wind-induced responses of the test model. The results showed that the wind-induced responses could be obviously reduced by the TMD, especially in the cross-wind direction. The cross-wind RMS and peak responses at the critical wind velocity can be reduced by about 86% and 75%, respectively. However, the maximum reduction of the responses at the design wind velocity is about 45%, obviously less than that at the critical wind velocity.
 
Key Words
    solar tower; tuned mass damper; eddy current damping; vortex-induced vibration; wind tunnel tests
 
Address
(1) Min Liu, Shouying Li, Zhengqing Chen:
Key Laboratory for Wind and Bridge Engineering of Hunan Province, College of Civil Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China
 

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