Investigation of the strut‐and‐tie model of a single‐plane cable‐stayed bridge tower under vertical component of the cable force

Abstract

AbstractThe design of reinforcement of concrete pylons in cable‐stayed bridges is a challenging task. Usually, only the influence of the strong horizontal component of the cable force is considered during the reinforcement design of the concrete tower, while the bursting forces caused by the vertical components of the cable forces are ignored. However, the latter is also an important factor for concrete cracking in bridge towers. In this paper, the concrete tower of a single cable plane cable‐stayed bridge is considered. The strut‐and‐tie model (STM) of the pylon wall subject to the vertical components of one single cable force was derived. Based on the minimum strain energy principle, an equation for predicting the bursting force was given. Then, the STMs of a concrete pylon with two cable forces with different vertical distances between cables were proposed. A series of equations for predicting the bursting force in different STMs were presented. The STMs of a concrete pylon with multiple cables were subsequently obtained from the STM for two cable forces. The analysis results show that the vertical distance between cables has a great influence on the STM configuration of the tower. When the cable distance is less than 0.7 times the width of the tower wall, the bursting force is larger than that when the cable distance is larger than 0.7 times the width of the tower wall. This study was expected to provide a reference in the design and applications of pylons of concrete cable‐stayed bridges.