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Title:

Evaluating Concrete Bridge Deck Performance Using Active Instrumentation

Accession Number:

01020493

Record Type:

Component

Availability:

Transportation Research Board Business Office

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Abstract:

Since the service life of concrete bridge decks designed by traditional procedures is often shorter than desired, their ability to withstand constant and heavy use in a variety of operating environments is of major concern. In this project, the relative performance of three bridge decks constructed with different concretes and reinforcing steel configurations is being studied to help determine which deck offers the best performance over time. To achieve this objective, an array of strain and temperature instrumentation was embedded in each of the bridge decks prior to placing the deck concrete. The decks are being tested periodically under controlled live loads in order to characterize their structural behavior. The first set of such tests was performed immediately after the bridge decks were completed, and the results of these tests are presented in this paper. The long term performance of the three decks under environmental loads (notably, changes in temperature) is being studied by continuously monitoring selected strain gages in each bridge, and by conducting periodic crack surveys and corrosion tests. In the data collected and analyzed to-date from the live load tests and environmental response monitoring of the three decks, only subtle behavioral differences have been observed. The bridges are relatively young (they are approximately 2 years old) and manifest few signs of deterioration; therefore, this uniformity in performance is not necessarily surprising. The observations and analyses to-date serve as a baseline measure of performance for future work on these bridge decks.

Monograph Accession #:

01020180

Report/Paper Numbers:

06-2941

Language:

English

Corporate Authors:

Transportation Research Board

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Authors:

Cuelho, Eli
Stephens, Jerry
Smolenski, Peter
Johnson, Jeff

Pagination:

16p

Publication Date:

2006

Conference:

Transportation Research Board 85th Annual Meeting

Location: Washington DC, United States
Date: 2006-1-22 to 2006-1-26
Sponsors: Transportation Research Board

Media Type:

CD-ROM

Features:

Figures (10) ; References (11)

Subject Areas:

Bridges and other structures; Design; Highways; Materials; I24: Design of Bridges and Retaining Walls; I32: Concrete

Source Data:

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2006 Paper #06-2941

Files:

BTRIS, TRIS, TRB

Created Date:

Mar 3 2006 11:10AM