Analysis of delay compensation in real-time dynamic hybrid testing with large integration time-step

With the sub-stepping technique, the numerical analysis in real-time dynamic hybrid testing is split into the response analysis and signal generation tasks. Two target computers that operate in real-time may be assigned to implement these two tasks, respectively, for fully extending the simulation scale of the numerical substructure. In this case, the integration time-step of solving the dynamic response of the numerical substructure can be dozens of times bigger than the sampling time-step of the controller. The time delay between the real and desired feedback forces becomes more striking, which challenges the well-developed delay compensation methods in real-time dynamic hybrid testing. This paper focuses on displacement prediction and force correction for delay compensation in the real-time dynamic hybrid testing with a large integration time-step. A new displacement prediction scheme is proposed based on recently-developed explicit integration algorithms and compared with several commonly-used prediction procedures. The evaluation of its prediction accuracy is carried out theoretically, numerically and experimentally. Results indicate that the accuracy and effectiveness of the proposed prediction method are of significance.