Monitoring structure condition and detecting structural damage at the earliest possible stage have
been a focus research recently. In this paper, a procedure for damage detection using wavelet
analysis is presented. Damage identification in beams includes two steps. The first step is to detect
the damage location, and the second step is to calculate the damage severity. A numerical simulation
by Matlab is created to calculate the beam mode shapes. The damage location could be obtained by
analyzing the fundamental mode shape by wavelet analysis. Effects of noise on detecting the damage
are analyzed. Experimental tests are done to validate this technique in detecting damage location and
damage severity. Two wavelet transforms (continuous, discrete) are used to analyze both the
calculated and measured fundamental mode shape. Detailed parametric studies were conducted by
changing damage location, intensity and wavelet families. These studies showed that the proposed
technique could accurately predict the damage location and its severity.