• Steel and Composite Structures
• /
• v.26 no.2
• /
• pp.183-196
• /
• 2018

The traditional prestressed concrete composite box-girders with corrugated steel webs have several drawbacks such as large deflection and potential local buckling. In this study, two methods were investigated to optimize and improve the prestressed concrete composite box-girders with corrugated steel webs. The first method was to replace the concrete bottom slab with a steel plate and the second method was to support the concrete bottom slab on the steel flanges. The behavior of the prestressed concrete composite box-girders with corrugated steel webs with either method was studied by experiments on three specimens. The test results showed that behavior of the optimized and upgraded prestressed concrete composite box-girders with corrugated steel webs, including ultimate bearing capacity, flexural stiffness, and crack resistance, is greatly improved. In addition, the influence of different shear connectors, including perfobond leisten (PBL) and stud shear connectors, on the behavior of prestressed concrete composite box-girders with corrugated steel webs was studied. The results showed that PBL shear connectors can greatly improve the ultimate bearing capacity, flexural stiffness and crack resistance property of the prestressed concrete composite box-girders with corrugated steel webs. However, for the efficiency of prestressing introduced into the girder, the PBL shear connectors do not perform as well as the stud shear connectors.

• Smart Structures and Systems
• /
• v.12 no.3_4
• /
• pp.327-344
• /
• 2013

Beam string structure (BSS) is introduced as a new type of hybrid prestressed string structures. The composition and mechanics features of BSS are discussed. The main principles of wavelet packet transform (WPT), principal component analysis (PCA) and support vector machine (SVM) have been reviewed. WPT is applied to the structural response signals, and feature vectors are obtained by feature extraction and PCA. The feature vectors are used for training and classification as the inputs of the support vector machine. The method is used to a single one-way arched beam string structure for damage detection. The cable prestress loss and web members damage experiment for a beam string structure is carried through. Different prestressing forces are applied on the cable to simulate cable prestress loss, the prestressing forces are calculated by the frequencies which are solved by Fourier transform or wavelet transform under impulse excitation. Test results verify this method is accurate and convenient. The damage cases of web members on the beam are tested to validate the efficiency of the method presented in this study. Wavelet packet decomposition is applied to the structural response signals under ambient vibration, feature vectors are obtained by feature extraction method. The feature vectors are used for training and classification as the inputs of the support vector machine. The structural damage position and degree can be identified and classified, and the test result is highly accurate especially combined with principle component analysis.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
• /
• v.50 no.4
• /
• pp.501-524
• /
• 2014

This paper presents a type of composite box girder with corrugated webs and concrete filled steel tube slab to overcome cracking on the web and reduce self-weight. Utilizing corrugated steel web improves the efficiency of prestressing introduced into the top and bottom slabs due to the accordion effect. In order to understand the loading capacity of such new composite structure, experimental and numerical analyses were conducted. A full-scale model was loaded monotonically to investigate the deflection, strain distribution, loading capacity and stiffness during the whole process. The experimental results show that test specimen has enough loading capacity and ductility. Based on experimental works, a finite element (FE) model was established. The load-displacement curves and stress distribution predicted by FE model agree well with that obtained from experiments, which demonstrates the accuracy of proposed FE model. Moreover, simplified theoretical analysis was conducted depending on the assumptions which were confirmed by the experimental and numerical results. The simplified analysis results are identical with the tested and numerical results, which indicate that simplified analytical model can be used to predict the loading capacity of such composite girder accurately. All the findings of present study may provide reference for the application of such structure in bridge construction.