TY - GEN
T1 - Pervasive lifetime inadequacy of long-span box girder bridges and lessons for multi-decade creep prediction
AU - Bažant, Z. P.
AU - Wendner, R.
AU - Hubler, M. H.
AU - Yu, Qiang
PY - 2012
Y1 - 2012
N2 - The present study was stimulated by the paradigm of KB Bridge in Palau, a record span segmentally erected concrete box girder, which deflected excessively within 18 years, and collapsed 3 months after remedial prestressing. Computations at Northwestern showed that obsolete creep and shrinkage models in standard recommendations are largely to blame. A literature search found that 68 further spans with similar excessive deflections and service lives shortened to 20-40 years were identified. Outlined is a method of 3D FE computation of multi-decade creep effects. It is shown that the computations match the multi-decade bridge observations of the KB and several other bridges provided one uses a recalibrated B3 model, while the obsolete creep and shrinkage models lead to severe underestimation of the multi-decade deflections and prestress losses. A recalibration of the B3 model is achievable through statistical coupling of partial data on bridge deflections with a world-wide laboratory database.
AB - The present study was stimulated by the paradigm of KB Bridge in Palau, a record span segmentally erected concrete box girder, which deflected excessively within 18 years, and collapsed 3 months after remedial prestressing. Computations at Northwestern showed that obsolete creep and shrinkage models in standard recommendations are largely to blame. A literature search found that 68 further spans with similar excessive deflections and service lives shortened to 20-40 years were identified. Outlined is a method of 3D FE computation of multi-decade creep effects. It is shown that the computations match the multi-decade bridge observations of the KB and several other bridges provided one uses a recalibrated B3 model, while the obsolete creep and shrinkage models lead to severe underestimation of the multi-decade deflections and prestress losses. A recalibration of the B3 model is achievable through statistical coupling of partial data on bridge deflections with a world-wide laboratory database.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84874517607&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84874517607&partnerID=8YFLogxK
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:84874517607
SN - 9780415621267
T3 - Life-Cycle and Sustainability of Civil Infrastructure Systems - Proceedings of the 3rd International Symposium on Life-Cycle Civil Engineering, IALCCE 2012
SP - 42
EP - 50
BT - Life-Cycle and Sustainability of Civil Infrastructure Systems - Proceedings of the 3rd International Symposium on Life-Cycle Civil Engineering, IALCCE 2012
T2 - 3rd International Symposium on Life-Cycle Civil Engineering, IALCCE 2012
Y2 - 3 October 2012 through 6 October 2012
ER -