Uncertainty of Peak Value of Non-Gaussian Wind Load Effect: Analytical Approach

Abstract

Estimating the peak value of wind load effects is an important task for engineers of structural and cladding design. Because of the various sources of uncertainties, such as the aerodynamic effect, model selection, and calibration errors, the peak wind load effects may have large variations. This study evaluates the uncertainty of the peak value of wind load effects across multiple samples from a wind tunnel. The Hermite polynomial model (HPM)-based translation process method is adopted to estimate the peak wind load effect. An empirical formula is proposed to estimate the parameters of peak value distribution. Two analytical approaches to model the uncertainty of the peak value at any fractile are proposed based on the probability function and the Gaussianity inference of the peak value. Numerical examples including the wind pressure coefficient and wind-induced response illustrate the performance of the proposed approaches.