Climatic Thermal Stresses in the Vätösund Box-Girder Concrete Bridge

TY - JOUR

T1 - Climatic Thermal Stresses in the Vätösund Box-Girder Concrete Bridge

AU - Larsson, Oskar

PY - 2012

Y1 - 2012

N2 - Severe cracks have been found in several box-girder bridges in Sweden, with the cracks being more frequent on the south side than the north. This indicates that solar radiation has a large impact on the stress field of these bridges, since this is the only factor that is significantly different between the walls. In this study the Vätösund Bridge has been modelled in a 3D FE-model to analyse the thermal stresses that occur due to climatic exposure. Meteorological data have been used to simulate the time variation of the temperature field, which is in turn used to simulate the resulting thermal stresses. The results show that the largest tensile stresses appear on the inside of the south wall, with a clear difference compared to the north. Large stresses appear both in the top and in the bottom parts of the south wall; this indicates that the cracks, which mainly appeared in the lower parts, at least partly originates from thermal effects. The boundary conditions at mid span have a large impact on the location and magnitude of the thermal tensile stresses. The results show that it is possible to predict where thermal stresses appear in a box-girder bridge using 3D FE-analysis.

AB - Severe cracks have been found in several box-girder bridges in Sweden, with the cracks being more frequent on the south side than the north. This indicates that solar radiation has a large impact on the stress field of these bridges, since this is the only factor that is significantly different between the walls. In this study the Vätösund Bridge has been modelled in a 3D FE-model to analyse the thermal stresses that occur due to climatic exposure. Meteorological data have been used to simulate the time variation of the temperature field, which is in turn used to simulate the resulting thermal stresses. The results show that the largest tensile stresses appear on the inside of the south wall, with a clear difference compared to the north. Large stresses appear both in the top and in the bottom parts of the south wall; this indicates that the cracks, which mainly appeared in the lower parts, at least partly originates from thermal effects. The boundary conditions at mid span have a large impact on the location and magnitude of the thermal tensile stresses. The results show that it is possible to predict where thermal stresses appear in a box-girder bridge using 3D FE-analysis.

KW - 3D FE-analysis

KW - solar radiation

KW - cracking

KW - temperature distribution

KW - thermal actions

KW - concrete bridge

KW - KstrConcrete

U2 - 10.2749/101686612X13363869853257

DO - 10.2749/101686612X13363869853257

M3 - Article

VL - 22

SP - 318

EP - 322

JO - Structural Engineering International: Journal of the International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE)

JF - Structural Engineering International: Journal of the International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE)

SN - 1683-0350

IS - 3

ER -