Abstract: Cross-tie is an effective measure to control vibration of long stay cables. Experimental studies are carried out to verify the damping effect of cross-ties with dampers in this paper, considering different number, position and damping coefficient of the cross-ties dampers. The tested model consists of three stay cables and one cross-tie. The cables were excited to certain amplitude of vibration, and then the free vibration time histories of the cables were recorded. The additional modal damping was calculated from the experimental data. The results show that: the cable network vibrates mainly in the global mode; the cross-tie with dampers can effectively improve the structural damping of cables, and the damping effect increases with the damping number and depends on the allocation and damping coefficients of the cross-tie dampers.