Frequency-domain subspace identification of nonlinear mechanical systems

The objective of the present paper is to address the identification of a real-life strongly nonlinear space structure, the EADS-Astrium SmallSat spacecraft. To this end, a new nonlinear subspace identification method formulated in the frequency domain is exploited, referred to as the FNSI method. The frequency response functions of the underlying linear spacecraft and the amplitudes of the nonlinear internal forces are estimated based on a periodic-random data set corrupted by noise. This application is challenging for several reasons, including high modal density, highly non-proportional damping and the non-smooth nature of the nonlinearities.