Identification of Moving Loads on a Rectangular Orthotropic Plate from Strains

A time domain method is presented to identify the moving loads on the bridge deck from measuring strains. The bridge deck is modelled as a rectangular orthotropic plate. The vehicle is modelled as two axle loads moving on the bridge deck. Like all inverse problems, the identification is an ill-posed problem, so a regularization technique is employed to stabilize the solution. This paper gives a demonstration on the robustness of the solution technique to the effects of measurement noise and in the identification of eccentric moving loads. Numerical examples show that the method is effective and practical for moving load identification.