Behavior of Prestressed Concrete Bridge Girders

• Main Author: Angomas, Franklin B.
• Format: Others
• Published: DigitalCommons@USU 2009
• Subjects: Bridges; Deflections; Girders; High Performance Concrete; Prestress Loss; Civil Engineering
• Online Access: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/405; https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1416&context=etd

For this research, prestress losses were monitored in six HPC bridge girders. These measured losses were compared to predicted losses according to four sources. Prestress loss predictive methods considered for this research were: 1- AASHTO LRFD 2004, 2- AASHTO LRFD 2004 Refined, 3- AASHTO LRFD 2007, and 4- AASHTO LRFD Lump Sum method. On the other hand, the camber prediction methods used in the present research were: 1- Time dependent method described in NCHRP Report 496, 2- PCI multiplier method, and 3- Improved PCI Multiplier method. For the purpose of this research, long-term prestress losses were monitored in select girders from Bridge 669 located near Farmington, Utah. Bridge 669 is a three-span prestress concrete girder bridge. The three spans have lengths of 132.2, 108.5, and 82.2 feet long, respectively. Eleven AASHTO Type VI precast prestressed girders were used to support the deck in each span. The deflection of several girders from a three-span, prestressed, precast concrete girder bridge was monitored for 3 years. Fifteen bridge girders were fabricated for the three span-bridge. Ten girders from the exterior spans had span length of 80 feet, and five girders from the middle span had span length of 137 feet. From the results of this research, in both the 82- and 132-foot-long, the AASHTO LRFD 2004 Refined Method does a better job predicting the prestress loss and it can be concluded that all the prediction methods do a better job predicting the loss for the larger girders. The Lump Sum method predicted very accurately the long term prestress loss for the 132-foot-long girders.