Abstract
The live load distribution factors (LLDFs) are typically used to calculate the stress resultants of the individual components from the total shear force and bending moment acting on the entire bridge cross-section. In this study, an evaluation of the LLDFs, suggested by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) specifications, for a pre-stressed reinforced concrete (RC) bridge was presented. A bridge consisting of five pre-cast pre-stressed RC girders was investigated experimentally and numerically using three cases of loading to obtain the maximum design live load and deflection values for all girders. In addition, a finite element (FE) analysis was implemented for the bridge by using ANSYS. Comparisons among the FE results and the available measured deflections showed a good agreement. The responses of the bridge, measured during the static loading test and the FE analysis, was used to evaluate the LLDFs presented by AASHTO. In addition, the FE results were used to evaluate the effect of Cross-Frame Diaphragms (CFD) on the LLDFs for pre-stressed RC bridges. Including CFD increased the LLDFs for exterior girders and decreased LLDFs for internal girders which confirmed the significance of the CFD to distribute live loads among the girders.
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Allawi, A., Al-Sherrawi, M., Al Gharawi, M., El-Zohairy, A. (2019). A Case Study to Evaluate Live Load Distributions for Pre-stressed RC Bridge. In: Arzoumanidis, A., Silberstein, M., Amirkhizi, A. (eds) Challenges in Mechanics of Time-Dependent Materials, Volume 2. Conference Proceedings of the Society for Experimental Mechanics Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95053-2_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95053-2_11
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