Natural vibration and wind-induced response analysis of the non-fully symmetric Geiger cable dome

Cable dome is a special flexible structure made of cable strut beam and membrane. Non-fully symmetric Geiger cable dome is a new Geiger cable dome with the characteristics of eighth symmetry and octagon plane. Membrane and initial prestress are the important portions of a cable dome and determined its dynamic properties. In this paper two aspects are analyzed to illustrate the dynamics properties of the non-fully symmetric Geiger cable dome. Firstly the natural vibration characteristics of three models (cable-strut-beam model, cable-membrane model and cable-strut-beam-membrane model) are comparatively analyzed. These researches indicate that membrane and initial prestress are proved to be the major effects on the natural vibration of the cable dome. Next, using linear filter Auto-Regressive (AR) method, the horizontal and vertical fluctuating wind velocity time-history curves of the cable dome are obtained. At the same time the shape coefficient of the cable dome is simulated by CFD method. The wind-induced response of cable-strut-beam-membrane model is analyzed by Newmark method. These results show that this cable dome is sensitive to the fluctuating wind load and this structure has deeper geometrical nonlinearity. These studies are valuable to the design of the non-fully symmetric Geiger cable dome.