An experimental and numerical approach to investigate the dynamic response of a four-flue chimney of a thermo-electrical plant

This paper describes an experimental procedure and a numerical model for the study of the dynamic behaviour of a chimney of a thermo-electrical plant. The experimental part is based on the measurement of the structure's dynamic response by means of several accelerometers. Different signals from forced time-periodic excitations, spanning a range of frequencies, have been collected and compared with those from a finite elements model. In particular, the first four modal shapes and their frequencies are computed. Following this validation, the finite element model has also been applied to investigate the response of the chimney subjected to a generic wind periodic excitation (vortex shedding). The numerical results show good agreement with the experimentally collected data.