Abstract Summary
The preservation of historic structures has become of primary importance in the civil engineering field due to their significant cultural value. However, destructive tests as well as invasive interventions should be limited as much as possible. In this contest, Finite Element model updating can be applied to optimize the numerical model by calibration of some unknown mechanical parameters. The solution of the inverse problem is obtained by minimizing the gap between corresponding experimental and numerical estimates of modal parameters. However, the application of Finite Element model updating is usually associated with large computational efforts, and the choice of a suitable surrogate model is fundamental for their reduction. Douglas-Reid method and Response Surface method are the most used due to their relatively simple quadratic formulations. While the approaches might appear quite similar, they have some peculiarities affecting their application and, in some cases, their performance. The present paper illustrates an application of Douglas-Reid method and Response Surface method to a historical tower, aimed at pointing out how the selected surrogate model affects model updating in terms of computational time and optimization results.
