Mathematical Problems in Engineering
Volume 4 (1998), Issue 5, Pages 393-421
doi:10.1155/S1024123X98000891

Torsional and longitudinal vibration of suspension bridge subject to aerodynamic forces

N. U. Ahmed and H. Harbi

Department of Electrical Engineering and Mathematics, University of Ottawa, 161 Louis Pasteur Street, PO Box 450 Stn. A, Ottawa K1N 6N5, Ontario, Canada

Received 27 January 1998

Copyright © 1998 N. U. Ahmed and H. Harbi. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

In this paper we consider a dynamic model of suspension bridge governed by a pair of coupled partial differential equations which describe both torsional and longitudinal vibration of the road bed. The vertical and torsional motions are coupled through a nonlinear operation with the nonlinearity arising from loss of tension in the vertical cables supporting the decks. We study the impact of wind forces on the stability of motion of this system both in the absence and presence of viscous and structural damping. The results are illustrated by numerical simulation.