NUMERICAL WIND TUNNEL TECHNIQUE FOR THE WIND RESISTANCE ANALYSIS OF LONG SPAN SPATIAL STRUCTURES

Based on Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), the numerical wind tunnel technique (NWTT) is studied, which is effectively applied to the investigation of the wind pressure distribution of complicated structural shapes. The wind fields around and close to structural surface and the wind-load shape coefficients were calculated. Some comparisons between numerical results and wind tunnel model test data were carried out. The changes of the wind-load shape coefficients and wind fields around the structures caused by other structural system were analyzed, and the possible errors and their reasons of the wind tunnel model test were discussed by means of the NWTT. Based on the wind pressure contours or constant value line of wind-load shape coefficients, the sub-areas subjected to different wind actions were plotted and the local wind-load shape coefficients corresponding to these sub-areas were obtained in terms of area weighted average strategy. Additionally, the wind-load shape coefficients under different wind angles were analyzed.