Time domain system identification of unknown initial conditions

System identification is a method for using measured data to create or improve a mathematical model of the object being tested. From the measured data however, noise is noticed at the beginning of the response. One solution to avoid this noise problem is to skip the noisy data and then use the initial conditions as active parameters, to be found by using the system identification process. This paper describes the development of the equations for setting up the initial conditions as active parameters. The simulated data and response data from actual shear buildings were used to prove the accuracy of both the algorithm and the computer program, which include the initial conditions as active parameters. The numerical and experimental model analysis showed that the value of mass, stiffness and frequency were very reasonable and that the computed acceleration and measured acceleration matched very well.