Approximate Series Solution for Analysis of FRP Composite Highway Bridges
Publication: Journal of Composites for Construction
Volume 10, Issue 4
Abstract
The design of a deck-and-stringer bridge system is usually reduced to the analysis of a T-beam section, loaded by concentrated loads corresponding to an equivalent fraction of the applied truck load. This equivalent load is defined by wheel load–distribution factors, which approximate the overall behavior of the bridge superstructure. In this paper, a one-term approximation of a macroflexibility series solution including deformations for fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) deck-and-stringer orthotropic bridge systems, is used to develop explicit expressions for symmetric and asymmetric load distribution factors. It is significant that the equations presented herein include important parameters that represent, as accurately as possible, the response characteristics of the super structure, such as the geometry and material properties of the FRP deck and stringers, bridge aspect ratio, and number and spacing of stringers. As an illustration in actual design applications, the formulation presented in this paper is used to develop an analytical method for FRP deck-and-stringer bridge systems, and the method is verified by predicting the response of an all FRP model bridge in the lab and an FRP deck on steel stringers in the field. The results of the present formulation compare well with experimental lab and field results. The simplified analysis presented in this paper can be used with sufficient accuracy for the design of composite FRP deck on stringers bridges.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
The writers would like to thank Mr. Dave Meggers of the Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) for providing the draft report on the KDOT/Crawford County Re-decking Project. The field testing of the bridge was sponsored by KDOT and conducted by Mr. John Schreiner, who at the time was a Master Student in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Missouri-Columbia (MU). Special thanks are due to C. H. Cassil for assisting in the field testing conducted by the MU research team.
References
AASHTO. (1996). Standard specifications for highway bridges, AASHTO, Washington, D.C.
Aref, A., and Parsons, I. D. (1996). “Design and analysis procedures for a novel fiber reinforced plastic bridge deck.” Advanced composite materials in bridges and structures, Canadian Society for Civil Engineering, Montréal, 743–750.
Bakis, C. E., Bank, L. C., Brown, V. L., Cosenza, E., Davalos, J. F., Lesko, J. J., Machida, A., Rizkalla, S. H., and Triantafillou, T. C. (2002). “Fiber-reinforced polymer composites for construction: State-of-the-art review,” J. Compos. Constr., 6(2), 73–87.
Bank, L. C., et al., (2000). “Construction of a pultruded composite structure: Case study.” J. Compos. Constr., 4(3), 112–119.
Barbero, E. J., Lopez-Anido, R., and Davalos, J. F. (1993). “On the mechanics of thin-walled laminated composite beams,” J. Compos. Mater., 27(8), 806–829.
Chajes, M., Gillespie, J., Mertz, D., and Shenton, H. (1998). “Advanced composite bridges in Delaware.” Proc., 2nd Int. Conf. on Composites in Infrastructure, Tuscon, Ariz., 645–650.
Clingenpeel, B., Barth, K. E., Davalos, J. F., and Plunkett, J. D. (2001). “Use of honeycomb FRP decks on West Virginia bridges.” Proc., 16th Annual Technical Conf. of the American Society of Composites (CD ROM), American Society of Composites, Blacksburg, Va.
Davalos, J. F., Qiao, P. Z., Xu, X., Robinson, J., and Barth, K. E. (2001). “Modeling and characterization of fiber-reinforced plastic honeycomb sandwich panels for highway bridge applications.” Compos. Struct., 52(3–4), 441–452.
Davalos, J. F., Salim, H. A., Qiao, P., Lopez-Anido, R., and Barbero, E. J. (1996). “Analysis and design of pultruded FRP shapes under bending.” Composites, Part B, 27(3–4), 295–305.
Foster, D. C., Richards, D., and Bogner, B. R. (2000). “Design and installation of fiber-reinforced polymer composite bridge.” J. Compos. Constr., 4(1), 33–37.
Hayes, M. D., Lesko, J. J., Haramis, J., Cousins, T. E., Gomez, J., and Masarelli, P. (2000a). “Laboratory and field testing of composite bridge superstructure.” J. Compos. Constr., 4(3), 120–128.
Hayes, M. D., Ohanehi, D., Lesko, J. J., Cousins, T. E., and Witcher, D. (2000b). “Performance of tube and plate fiberglass composite bridge deck.” J. Compos. Constr., 4(2), 48–55.
Kumar, P., Chandrashekhara, K., and Nanni, A. (2004). “Structural performance of a FRP bridge deck.” Construction and building materials, Vol. 18, Elsevier, New York, 35–47.
Lopez-Anido, R., GangaRao, H. V. S., and Williams, D. (1997). “Design and construction of short-span bridge with fiber reinforced plastic materials.” Proc., 14th Annual Int. Bridge Conf. and Exhibition, Pittsburgh, 513–520.
Meggers, D. (2001). “KDOT FRP bridge deck replacement project.” Draft Rep., Kansas State Univ. and Kansas Dept. of Transportation, Manhattan, Kan.
Plunkett, J. D. (1997). “Fiber-reinforced polymer honeycomb short span bridge for rapid installation.” IDEA, Transportation Research Council No. NCHRP-96-IDO30, National Research Council, Washington, D.C.
Qiao, P. Z., Davalos, J. F., and Brown, B. (2000). “A systematic analysis and design approach for single-span FRP deck/stringer bridges.” Composites, Part B, 31, 593–609.
Reddy, J. N. (1984). Energy and variational methods in applied mechanics, Wiley, New York.
Salim, H. (1997). “Modeling and application of thin-walled composite beams in bending and torsion.” Ph.D. dissertation, West Virginia Univ., Morgantown, W.Va.
Salim, H. A., Davalos, J. F., GangaRao, H. V. S., and Raju, P. (1995). “An approximate series solution for design of deck-and-stringer bridges.” Int. J. Eng. Anal. Design, 2, 15–31.
Schreiner, J., and Barker, M. G. (2000). “Lateral distribution in Kansas DOT steel girder bridge with FRP deck.” Final Rep., Kansas State Univ. and Kansas Dept. of Transportation, Manhattan, Kan.
William, B., Rizkallah, S., Shehata, E., Stewart, D., and Church, K. (2000). “Development of modular GFRP bridge decks.” Proc., Advanced Composite Materials in Bridges and Structures, Ottawa, 95–102.
Zureick, A. H., Shih, B., and Munley, E. (1995). “Fiber-reinforced polymeric bridge decks.” Struct. Eng. Rev., 7(3), 257–266.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Composites for Construction
Volume 10 • Issue 4 • August 2006
Pages: 357 - 366
Copyright
© 2006 ASCE.
History
Received: Mar 10, 2004
Accepted: Oct 20, 2005
Published online: Aug 1, 2006
Published in print: Aug 2006
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.