A Contribution to the Modal Identification of the Damping Factor based on the Dissipated Energy

ABSTRACT: The identification of the modal parameters from frequency response functions is a subject that is not new. However, the starting point often comes from the equations that govern the dynamic motion. In this paper, a novel approach is shown, resulting from an analysis that starts on the dissipated energy per cycle of vibration. For lightly damped systems with conveniently spaced modes, it produced quite accurate results in comparison to the direct application of the method of the inverse, both in the numerical and in the experimental examples. It also is a simple technique that can be used to produce quick estimates of the modal damping factors. Furthermore, this is also a contribution to further developments on modal analysis and identification methods as, up to today, the developed technique has not yet been proposed.