Effect of resonance in

materials design
-The Mexico Earthquake (1985)
-The Tacoma Narrows Bridge (1940)

Abhishek Deshmukh
Pushkar Agnihotri
Abhinav Chandraker
Resonance:

The condition in which an object or system is subjected to an oscillating force having a frequency
close to its own natural frequency.

Examples:

1. Excitation by the acoustic frequency of the marching soldiers led to the collapse of the Broughton
suspension bridge in 1831 and the Angers Bridge in France in 1850.
2. Total destruction of multi bladed helicopters while on the ground is a case of resonance of the
helicopter due to shocks from the landing gear known as “ground resonance”
3. The failure of many midrise buildings during the earthquakes is due to resonance (The 1985
Mexico Earthquake).
The 1985 Mexico Earthquake:

● Most buildings collapsed not due to the splitting of ground or due to direct movement of
tectonic plates but rather due to the oscillations caused by the shockwaves from the
earthquake.
● The strength of these oscillations depend on 2 main factors i.e. its mass and stiffness. Shorter
buildings tend to be stiffer and larger buildings are more flexible.
● Mostly buildings 6-15 stories high collapsed but the buildings that were shorter/higher than this
suffered much less damage
● This happened because the frequency of the seismic waves happened to match with the natural
frequency of the mid size buildings giving rise to resonance
● Increasing the mass slows down the rate at which it naturally vibrates whereas, increasing
stiffness makes it vibrate faster.
● Mass is inversely proportional to natural frequency and stiffness is directly proportional to
frequency.
Solution:
Devise some kind of mechanism to absorb the shocks and limit deformation using innovative systems
E.g. The Taipei 101, one of the tallest buildings in the world, has a 660 Ton pendulum acting as mass
damper to cancel any resonance by oscillating in opposite direction, etc.
Tacoma Narrows Bridge (1940) – (Nicknamed Galloping Gertie)

Transverse vibrational mode - One-half of the central span rises while the other lowers. Drivers would see cars
approaching from the other direction rise and fall.

Torsional vibration mode - When the left side of the roadway goes down, the right side rises, and vice versa, with
the centerline of the road remaining motionless.
Background and construction details

● opened to traffic on July 1, 1940 and collapsed on November 7 of the same year
● was the third-longest suspension bridge in the world with main span of 2,800 feet (850 m)
● it was quite narrow; just 39 feet (12 m) wide, and expected minimal traffic volume
● with only 8-foot-deep (2.4 m) plate girders providing depth, the bridge's roadway section was also shallow

Plate girder
Different phenomenon taking place -

1. Vortex shedding
• An oscillating flow that takes place when a fluid such as air or water flows past a bluff (as opposed to
streamlined) body at certain velocities, depending on the size and shape of the body. 
• Kármán vortex street - a repeating pattern of swirling vortices, caused by vortex shedding, which is
responsible for the unsteady separation of flow of a fluid around blunt bodies.
• If the frequency of vortex shedding is close enough to one of the natural vibration frequencies of the
structure, the structure will begin to resonate and the structure's movement can become self-sustaining.

Vortex shedding behind a circular cylinder. The Alternating low-pressure vortices

flow on the two sides of the cylinder are shown in
different colors, to show that the vortices from
the two sides alternate.
2. Aeroelastic Fluttering

Occurs as a result of interaction between aerodynamics, stiffness and inertial forces on a structure.

A dynamic instability of an elastic structure in a fluid flow, caused by positive feedback between the body's deflection
and the force exerted by the fluid flow.

A physical phenomenon in which several degrees of freedom of a structure become coupled in an unstable oscillation
driven by the wind. Eventually, the amplitude of the motion produced by the fluttering increased beyond the strength
of a vital part, in this case the suspender cables.
 Resonance vs. non-resonance

• According to Professor Farquharson, the wind was steady at 42 miles per hour (68 km/h), the frequency of the
destructive mode was 12 cycles/minute (0.2 Hz). This frequency was neither a natural mode of the isolated
structure nor the frequency of blunt-body vortex shedding of the bridge at that wind speed (which was
approximately 1 Hz). It can be concluded therefore that the vortex shedding was not the cause of the bridge
collapse. (The event can be understood only while considering the coupled aerodynamic and structural system that
requires rigorous mathematical analysis to reveal all the degrees of freedom of the particular structure and the set
of design loads imposed.)

• Federal Works Administration report – “it was found that there is no sharp correlation between wind velocity and
oscillation frequency such as is required in case of resonance with vortices whose frequency depends on the wind
velocity.”

• 1991 American Journal of Physics article – “the failure of the bridge was related to a wind-driven amplification of
the torsional oscillation that, unlike a resonance, increases monotonically with increasing wind speed.”
Cause of Collapse -
Misconception - The cause of the failure of the Tacoma Narrows bridge was externally forced mechanical resonance.

Real cause - Normal speed winds produced aeroelastic flutter that matched the bridge's natural frequency.

H type configuration which has a very poor aerodynamic

performance
Inferences and learning -

Factors responsible for this -

● a lack of foresight and testing while designing and cheap construction techniques

● the bridge had a set of eight-foot-deep (2.4 m) plate girders (costing 8 million dollars) rather than the 25-
foot-deep (7.6 m) trusses (costing 11 million dollars) proposed by the Washington Toll Bridge Authority

● shallow and narrow girders - With such minimal girders, the deck of the bridge was insufficiently rigid and
was easily moved about by winds

● very poor aerodynamic shape

Remedies and Advancements

● The catastrophe boosted research into bridge aerodynamics and aeroelastics.

● Trusses were used weigh down and stiffen other similar bridges.
● Wind tunnel tests started to be done on scaled down models of bridge designs.
● As a result, development of box girder bridges with aerofoil shape took place in the 1960s.
● A new bridge was constructed in 1950 with a wider deck and taller and wider towers than its predecessor.
Thank you