Gradually improving the readability of the time-frequency spectra for natural frequency identification in cantilever beams

Abstract

It is the purpose of the paper to stimulate a systematic investigation of the time-frequency methods used to extract the natural frequency of mechanical structures. In particular, we are interested in cantilever beams, which are simple structures in mechanics, and therefore most appropriate for detailed comparison. We will compare the refined time-frequency spectra for the short-time Fourier transform, for the Wigner transform and for the non-stationary Gabor transform and extract a set of natural frequencies from the accelerometer data placed at the free end of a cantilever beam.