Application of the Nonlinear Energy Sink Systems in Vibration Suppression of Railway Bridges

Vibration suppression of railway bridges using nonlinear energy sink systems (NES) is studied in this paper. Train is modeled as a set of successive moving loads traveling on an Euler-Bernoulli beam. Energy sink as a new passive control strategy is employed as the suppression system. Galerkin method here is adopted as the solution technique. Within a parametric study, series of numerical simulations are carried out and performance of the passive control system is investigated. It is numerically found that an appropriately designed NES can passively reduce the displacement of the bridge up to 43%.