Method of animating structural vibration under operational conditions

1. A method of analyzing structural vibration, comprising:

receiving data from a plurality of sensors on a structure, said receiving comprising:

mounting a first sensor to the structure to measure data along a first axis;

mounting a second sensor to the structure adjacent to the first sensor to measure data along a second axis that is perpendicular to the first axis;

mounting a third sensor to the structure adjacent to the first and second sensors to measure data along a third axis that is perpendicular to the first axis and the second axis;

filtering the data to exclude data outside of a selected frequency band;

associating each sensor location with a location on a computer model of the structure; and

generating an animation of the filtered data.

2. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein said sensors are accelerometers and said data is acceleration data.

3. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein said receiving includes:

repeating said steps of mounting a first sensor, mounting a second sensor, and mounting a third sensor for a plurality of locations.

4. The method as recited in claim 1 , further comprising:

applying test conditions to the structure; and

receiving transmissions of data from each of the plurality of sensors.

5. A method of analyzing structural vibration, comprising:

receiving data from a plurality of sensors on a structure;

filtering the data to exclude data outside of a selected frequency band;

associating each sensor location with a location on a computer model of the structure; and

generating an animation of the filtered data, said generating comprising:

receiving a computer model orientation selection;

determining a magnitude of deflection of each of the plurality of sensor locations at a selected time from the filtered data;

recording an image displaying the plurality of sensor locations at the selected orientation reflecting the deflections from said step of determining a magnitude of deflection

selectively repeating said steps of determining a magnitude of deflection and recording an image displaying the plurality of sensor locations at a plurality of time intervals to obtain a desired quantity of images; and

displaying the recorded images in succession to provide an animation of the filtered data.

6. The method as recited in claim 5 , including:

storing the recorded images in memory in a video file.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the video file is an AVI file.

8. The method as recited in claim 5 , wherein at least a portion of the recorded images also display the plurality of sensor locations prior to deflection.