Abstract
The most common damages in existing highway and railway steel bridges are related to fatigue and are, as reported in the literature, found in the structural system of the bridge deck. This paper proposes a methodology for detecting damaged joint connections in existing steel bridges to improve the quality of bridge inspections. The methodology combines the use of temporal moments from response measurements with an appropriate instrumentation setup. Damaged joint connections are identified by comparing statistical parameters based on temporal moments to a baseline, where the baseline data are established from statistical parameters evaluated for all considered joint connections. Localization of damaged joint connections is performed by utilizing the instrumentation setup. The feasibility of the proposed methodology is demonstrated through an experimental study on a full-scale steel riveted truss bridge with two known damages below the bridge deck, where both damages are identified and localized. The proposed methodology can improve the identification of critical structural damage during bridge inspections and is applicable to open-deck steel bridges.
Highlights
Deterioration and ageing of infrastructure is a major concern worldwide
Many of the existing bridges built in the first half of the 20th century in Europe and the U.S are made of steel. e primary damage mechanism in these bridges is fatigue, and the most common types of fatigue damage reported are found in the structural system of the bridge deck [1]
Several case studies are performed on service life estimation and fatigue reliability analysis of structural components in the bridge deck structural system of steel bridges [2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9]. e connections between longitudinal stringers and transverse girders are critical and have been subject to investigation in studies of railway bridges [10,11,12,13,14,15,16]. ese stringer-to-girder connections are not accessible and are difficult to inspect. e induced damages involve cracking in various parts of the connections and can, if not detected at an early stage, develop and lead to component failure being critical for the structural integrity
Summary
Deterioration and ageing of infrastructure is a major concern worldwide. Many highway and railway bridges are subject to increasing demands with respect to traffic loads and intensity, even though these structures are approaching or have exceeded their original design life. E connections between longitudinal stringers and transverse girders are critical and have been subject to investigation in studies of railway bridges [10,11,12,13,14,15,16]. A new methodology is proposed to detect damage in stringer-to-girder connections from the bridge deck to improve the process and quality of bridge inspections. By applying the method of temporal moments to the transient part of the acceleration response, feature vectors containing statistical parameters are established for the stringer-to-girder connections. E feasibility of the proposed methodology is discussed with respect to its applicability to similar bridges in service, in particular as a part of a general inspection plan for damage detection Damaged connections are identified and localized by (1) investigation of individual statistical parameters and (2) establishing a damage indicator matrix by comparing feature vectors using a correlation analysis. e effect of sampling frequency is investigated. e feasibility of the proposed methodology is discussed with respect to its applicability to similar bridges in service, in particular as a part of a general inspection plan for damage detection
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