Substructure decoupling techniques - A review and uncertainty propagation analysis

In recent years, the structural dynamic community showed a renewed interest in substructure coupling techniques, i.e. applying dynamic substructuring concepts, especially in an experimental context. In this context the problem of propagation of uncertainty due to measurement errors was also investigated. In this paper the reverse problem is addressed: the decoupling (or identification) of a substructure from the assembled system. This problem arises when substructures cannot be measured separately but only when coupled to neighboring substructures, a situation regularly encountered in practice. Two different approaches to substructure decoupling will be reviewed in this paper. Moreover, their accuracy due to measurement errors will be investigated by performing an uncertainty propagation analysis. Both methodologies will be applied to a simulated experiment.