Automated damage detection in miter gates of navigation locks

Abstract

SummaryNavigation locks are critical infrastructure components, and their closure for maintenance and repair can have significant impacts on the global economy. The current state of inspection and monitoring of lock components is generally to close the lock and perform a visual inspection. Whereas structural health monitoring of navigation locks is gaining acceptance, automation of the structural health monitoring process is lacking. This paper reports on efforts to develop an automated damage detection system for miter gates of navigation locks. The study focuses on using strain gage measurements to identify the redistribution of load throughout lock gates in the presence of damage. To eliminate the environmental variability in the data, a new damage-sensitive feature is introduced, termed here as "slope" and defined as the derivative of the strain with respect to the water levels in the lock chamber. The slopes form a new, stationary time series effectively purged of environmental effects. A principal component analysis, a method of analyzing multivariate, stationary time series, is then used to detect significant changes in the statistics of slopes as an indication of damage. To validate the approach, damage is simulated in a finite element model, and the resulting changes in strain from the finite element model are superimposed on the measured data. The results demonstrate the potential of the proposed approach for detecting damage in navigational lock gates.

Nondestructive Testing of the Miter Gates Using Various Measurement Methods

“…In [59] a similar problem was presented, which occurred in the case of the Red River Lock and Dam no 1. In [1], the authors also paid attention to the importance of adherence of the bearings for the appropriate distribution of loads. In our case, there is a possibility that the miter gates before filling are closed with misaligned miter bearings.…”

“…x(k + 1) = Ax(k) + Bu(k)y(k) = Cx(k) + Du(k) (1) where x(k) is the vector of states, u(k) is the vector of system inputs, and y(k) is the vector of system outputs at the k-th step. A, B, C, D are the discrete-time state-space matrices.…”

“…Given the high importance of facilities in the form of locks on waterways, the detection of possible failures and appropriate monitoring of the facilities has a significant impact on the economic situation in the region. Their inspection usually involves the use of visual methods using surveying techniques combined with numerical calculations which are presented in [1]. In our opinion, empirical knowledge of the world today is primarily associated with the use of available methods of multidisciplinary significance.…”

Feasibility of discontinuous quoin blocks for USACE miter gates

“…One of the primary motivations for the installation of continuous quoin blocks is the notion that a continuous quoin block facilitates an even distribution of stress throughout the quoin region. However, previous modeling efforts (Eick et al 2018) have highlighted that the quoin block does not provide an even stress distribution. Figure 7(a) provides an elevation view of the gate that was modeled using the commercial software Abaqu.…”

“…In previous modeling efforts (Eick 2018), the quoin area of the lock gate was greatly simplified by using a simple pin boundary condition that was applied to a line of nodes along the entire height of the quoin. This simplification was reasonable because, for those analyses, stress values immediately next to the quoin were not of interest to the study.…”