Numerical analysis on fatigue behavior of ultrahigh-performance concrete-Orthotropic steel composite bridge deck

Ultrahigh-performance concrete-orthotropic steel composite bridge deck is composed of the orthotropic steel deck and a thin ultrahigh-performance concrete (UHPC) overlayer. In the previous fatigue tests, two typical fatigue failure modes were found and identified. As a supplementary test after fatigue tests, air penetration method is capable of providing a reference to the quantitative and non-destructive damage detection of fatigue damage of UHPC. To further the previous study, a detailed numerical investigation is accomplished through complimentary finite element (FE) analysis. Compared with the solid element model, the refined shell-solid element model can better reflect the mechanical behavior. It is illustrated that the vertical stress can be adopted in assessing the fatigue strength of rib-to-diaphragm welded connection in the field test by means of nominal stress method. The combination of various factors would lead to fatigue shear failure of the short headed-studs. The fatigue strength of rib-to-diaphragm welded connection predicted by the hot spot stress method and the consistent nominal stress (CNS) method can basically meet the requirements of FAT90. The consistent nominal stress method can be used as the optimization method of nominal stress of fatigue detail. It is demonstrated that the fatigue life of UHPC can be estimated by S-N curves of ordinary concrete conservatively. The allowable equivalent maximum stress level can be taken as 0.55 for two million cycles of fatigue loading, and 0.52 for five million cycles of fatigue loading.

Study on stud performance of steel UHPC composite structure based on temperature

The stress and deformation of the specimen under static load and temperature load coupling are deduced by simulation. With the help of finite element software ABAQUS, the user subroutines DFLUX and FILM are called to introduce the temperature field, so as to realize the analysis and Research on the stress, displacement, PEEQ, arrangement and load slip curve of the stud under different action conditions. The results show that based on the existence of temperature stress, the service performance of studs under coupling action is significantly lower than that under static action alone, and the proportion of shear performance of studs in different rows is different. Through the research and analysis of the above phenomena, it can provide reference value for the research of temperature on the performance of studs in composite bridge deck and prolong the service life of bridge deck.

Study on the life cycle simulation method of the temperature field and temperature effect of a steel–concrete composite bridge deck system

Traditional theoretical calculations, field measurements, and finite element methods sometimes fail to realize life cycle simulations of the temperature field and temperature effect of steel–concrete composite bridge deck systems. In this paper, a simulation method based on a back propagation–long short-term memory (BP-LSTM) network correlation model is proposed to predict the temperature field and temperature effect in a low-cost and highly efficient manner. A bridge was used as the engineering background according to a health monitoring system, and the finite element method based on the principle of heat transfer was used to expand the data sets. Data sets with structural, time, and environmental characteristics as the independent variables and temperature and the temperature effect as the dependent variables were formed. The correlation between the dependent and independent variables was verified using the maximal information coefficient. Thus, the BP-LSTM model was established, and the mean squared error loss function considering the time weight was designed. The data set was read in for training, verification, and testing, and a correlation model representing the relationship between the set’s independent and dependent variables was obtained with relatively high accuracy. Finally, combined with the bridge’s historical meteorological data, the established correlation model was used to simulate the bridge’s temperature field and temperature effect. The results indicated that the finite element calculation results of the structure’s temperature field based on the heat transfer principle were basically consistent with the measured results. The independent variables in the data set were non-linearly related to the dependent variables. The BP-LSTM’s prediction accuracy of the temperature field and temperature effect was above 98.8% and 94.5%, respectively, in good agreement with the target value. The variation law of the temperature field and temperature effect of the steel–concrete composite bridge deck system simulated by combining the historical meteorological statistics was in accordance with reality.

Experimental study and numerical simulation of temperature gradient effect for steel-concrete composite bridge deck

The temperature distribution of the bridge and its thermal effect has always been an important issue for researchers. To investigate the temperature distribution and thermal stress in the steel-concrete composite bridge deck, a 1:4 ratio temperature gradient effect experimental study was carried out in this paper. First, a set of experimental equipment for laboratory temperature gradient loading was designed based on the principle of temperature gradient caused by solar radiation, the temperature gradient obtained from the measurements were compared with the specifications and verified by the FE method. Next, the loading of the steel-concrete composite deck at different temperatures was performed. The thermal stress response and change trend of the simply supported and continuously constrained boundary conditions under different temperature loads were analyzed. The experimental results show that the vertical temperature of steel-concrete composite bridge deck is nonlinear, which is consistent with the temperature gradient trend of specifications. The vertical temperature gradient has a great influence on the steel-concrete composite bridge deck under different constraints, and the extreme stress of concrete slab and steel beam is almost linear with the temperature gradient. Finally, some suggestions for steel-concrete composite deck design were provided based on the research results.

Study on Bending Performance of Epoxy Adhesive Prefabricated UHPC-Steel Composite Bridge Deck

UHPC has high strength, high toughness, and excellent durability. For orthotropic steel bridge deck pavement, UHPC can significantly increase the bridge deck’s stiffness and then solve the problems of fatigue cracking and pavement damage of the bridge deck. However, if UHPC adopts cast-in-place construction, its self-shrinkage can easily cause shrinkage cracks, and it requires high maintenance conditions. Meanwhile, the traditional stud connection will bring a great deal of welding work and cause welding fatigue. In contrast, prefabricated UHPC pavement and orthotropic steel bridge deck can greatly reduce the amount of welding of studs on the bridge deck through epoxy bonding, thus speeding up the construction process and avoiding the risk of cracking caused by UHPC self-shrinkage. In order to consider the influence of the surface state of interface and ratio of shear span to depth on flexural behavior of epoxy adhesive prefabricated UHPC-steel composite bridge deck, positive bending moment loading test with different ratios of shear span to depth was carried out, and the failure mode, load-deflection curve, interface slip, and strain distribution of the specimens were obtained. Finally, based on the cohesive interface element, the prefabricated UHPC-steel epoxy bonding interface was successfully simulated. The test results show that each specimen’s loading stage can be divided into the elastic stage, crack initiation stage, interfacial crack propagation stage, interface failure stage, and yield stage. The specimen’s ultimate failure is that the interface failure is prior to the yield at the bottom of the steel plate. During the loading process, the bending performance shows that the ultimate load P B i and growth deflection Δ δ B i C i of CD-ERA-P-λ4.44 are higher than those of other specimens in terms of the load-deflection curve. The ultimate load of CD-ERA-P-λ3.33 is lower than that of CD-ERG-P-λ3.33, which decreases by 4.6%, but the increasing deflection increases by 75%. Simultaneously, the interface slip of the specimen is similar, which further shows that the specimen has the best bending performance when the surface of the steel plate is rough (R) and the surface of the prefabricated UHPC plate is grooved (A). No matter what kind of surface is used at the interface, the reduction of the ratio of shear span to depth will aggravate the ultimate failure of the interface and the cracking of the precast UHPC slab. Finally, the bending performance of epoxy adhesive prefabricated UHPC-steel composite bridge deck is successfully simulated based on the cohesive interface element, which is verified by the test results.