Upgrading Era Reinforced Concrete Bridge Girder Using U-Shaped Steel Plate Jacketing

Wosen Hirpa, Tesfaye Alemu (PhD)
2021
Strengthening Reinforced Concrete (RC) girder/beams are required due to design errors, deficient concrete production, bad execution processes, damage due to earthquake, accidents such as collisions, fire, explosions, and situations involving changes in the functionality of the structure. This study presents numerical investigation of as built and U-shaped strengthened 8 girders of size 12.6m span and 400 mm x 780 mm cross sections subjected to monotonic loading. The girders were reproduced from
more » ... ERA Bridge Manual. Also, experimental result reported in literature was used for validation analysis to verify accuracy of developed ANSYS finite element models. U-shaped strengthening with four different material options such as Rebar Steel/Carbon Steel, Alloy Steel, Mild steel, and Stainless Steel; and two different strengthening material thickness parameters were studied. FE results showed U-shaped strengthening offered excellent improvement in strength and ductility. As compared to control, U-shaped strengthening resulted in 46.5% and 34.1% increase in ultimate load-carrying capacity of a girder for 8mm and 4mm retrofitting material thickness respectively. Also, the maximum stress intensity gain is reported as 34.1% for 8mm thickness plates and 31.4% for 4mm thick plates.
doi:10.20372/nadre/20598 fatcat:c2tgcqh3wjbhjkdh6nhbjj3tfa