Nondestructive Testing of Bridge Stay Cable Surface Defects Based on Computer Vision

The automatically defect detection method using vision inspectionis a promising direction. In this paper, an efficient defect detection method fordetecting surface damage to cables on a cable-stayed bridge automatically isdeveloped. A mechanism design method for the protective layer of cables of abridge based on vision inspection and diameter measurement is proposed bycombining computer vision and diameter measurement techniques. A detectionsystem for the surface damages of cables is de-signed. Images of cablesurfaces are then enhanced and subjected to threshold segmentation by utilizingthe improved local grey contrast enhancement method and the improvedmaximum correlation method. Afterwards, the data obtained through diametermeasurement are mined by employing the moving average method. Imageenhancement, threshold segmentation, and diameter measurement methodsare separately validated experimentally. The experimental test results showthat the system delivers recall ratios for type-I and II surface defects of cablesreaching 80.4% and 85.2% respectively, which accurately detects bulges oncable surfaces.

A Method in Mixed Frequency-time domain for Fatigue Life Estimation of Steel Girders of Cable-stayed Bridges Due to Buffeting

发展了斜拉桥钢主梁抖振疲劳寿命的混合时－频域方法．在本方法中，首先建立了桥面处的风速风向概率密度函数，导出的应力谱因其包括背景分量而不再是窄带谱．据应力谱模拟出了疲劳应力的时间历程，并用雨流计数法统计了其幅值特性．基于修正的Ｍｉｎｅｒ定理导出了考虑风速风向作用的桥梁主梁抖振疲劳寿命的估算公式，并用此分析了杨浦大桥钢主梁的抖振疲劳寿命．结果表明，风向对抖振疲劳寿命有很大影响；杨浦大桥主梁的疲劳寿命远大于设计寿命．

Comparative Study on Structural Redundancy of Cable-Stayed and Extradosed Bridges Through Safety Assessment of Their Stay Cables

This study provides new insights into the comparison of cable-stayed and extradosed bridges based on the safety assessment of their stay cables.These bridges are often regarded as identical structures owing to the use of inclined cables;however,the international standards for bridge design stipulate different safety factors for stay cables of both types of bridges.To address this misconception,a comparative study was carried out on the safety factors of stay cables under fatigue and ultimate limit states by considering the effects of various untoward and damaging factors,such as overloading,cable loss,and corrosion.The primary goal of this study is to describe the structural disparities between both types of bridges and evaluate their structural redundancies by employing deterministic and nondeterministic methods.To achieve this goal,three-dimensional finite-element models of both bridges were developed based on the current design guidelines for stay cables in Japan.After the balanced states of the bridge models were achieved,static analyses were performed for different safety factors of stay cables in a parametric manner.Finally,the first-order reliability method and Monte Carlo method were applied to determine the reliability index of stay cables.The analysis results show that cable-stayed and extradosed bridges exhibit different structural redundancies for different safety factors under the same loading conditions.Moreover,a significant increase in structural redundancy occurs with an incremental increase in the safety factors of stay cables.

Parametrically excited oscillation of stay cable and its control in cable-stayed bridges＂

This paper presents a nonlinear dynamic model for simulation and analysis of a kind of parametrically excited vibration of stay cable caused by support motion in cable-stayed bridges. The sag, inclination angle of the stay cable are considered in the model, based on which, the oscillation mechanism and dynamic response characteristics of this kind of vibration are analyzed through numerical calculation. It is noted that parametrically excited oscillation of a stay cable with certain sag, inclination angle and initial static tension force may occur in cable-stayed bridges due to deck vibration under the condition that the natural frequency of a cable approaches to about half of the first model frequency of the bridge deck system. A new vibration control system installed on the cable anchorage is proposed as a possible damping system to suppress the cable parametric oscillation. The numerical calculation results showed that with the use of this damping system, the cable oscillation due to the vibration of the deck and/or towers will be considerably reduced.

Dynamic Characteristics Evaluation of Innovative UHPC Pedestrian Cable Stayed Bridge

KICT (Korea Institute of Construction Technology) is conducting a project called “SUPER BRIDGE 200—Development of Low Cost and Long Life Hybrid Cable Stayed Bridge”. This project aims to reduce the construction and main- tenance costs of long-span bridges by 20% and double their lifetime through the exploitation of ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC). This paper presents the design and construction of the first pedestrian cable stayed bridge using UHPC developed by KICT. UHPC, compared to conventional concrete, has not only high compressive and tensile strengths but also high ductility. The UHPC developed at KICT is a steel fiber-reinforced cement compound presenting design compressive strength larger than 180 MPa and design tensile strength exceeding 10 MPa with water-to-binder ratio below 0.24 and admixing of 2 volume percentage of steel fiber. To show the applicability of UHPC to structures, a pedestrian cable stayed bridge (Super Bridge I) exploiting the characteristics of the developed UHPC has been planned, designed and erected at KICT. The dimension of UHPC deck is 2.7 m × 7 m as a precast segment with a typical thickness of deck of only 7 cm. However, harmful crack was observed in the deck at the time of the fabrication of the deck segments. Accordingly, new fabrication method was conceived and applied to prevent cracking of the UHPC slender deck. Four UHPC deck segments were fabricated successfully without any crack. After construction, the dynamic characteristics (natural frequencies and mode shapes) were evaluated through vibration tests since several users felt excess vibration. A vertical tuned mass damper (TMD) was proposed and installed on the parapet of the bridge. The TMD reduces the acceleration by about 30% from 0.0316 g to 0.0244 g when two pedestrians are crossing the bridge.

A new monitoring method of cable tension of cable-stayed bridge—fiber Bragg grating method

A new on-line monitoring method based on fiber Bragg grating(FBG) for cable tension of cable-stayed bridge was introduced. The major structure of sensing head using in the test of cable tension is elastic annular. The FBG is attached inflexibility to the exterior surface of annulus and form straight-through sensing head. Sensing head is installed between the anchor device and stow-board of funiculus holes of the cable-stayed bridge. Accompany with the change of the outside pressure, the Bragg center reflective wavelength of optical fiber grating changed correspondingly. According to this characteristic, through demodulating the Δλ, the value of the cable tension can be determined. The experiment results and the theory indicate that the test system has simple structure, good stability and linear,wide response capacity, and has no special request for tester, The measurement method for the test of cable tension is practical and effective.

A simplified fragility analysis of fan type cable stayed bridges

A simplified fragility analysis of fan type cable stayed bridges usingProbabilistic Risk Analysis (PRA) procedure is presented for determining their failure probabilityunder random ground motion. Seismic input to the bridge support is considered to be a riskconsistent response spectrum which is obtained from a separate analysis. For the response analysis,the bridge deck is modeled as a beam supported on springs at different points. The stiffnesses ofthe springs are determined by a separate 2D static analysis of cable-tower-deck system. The analysisprovides a coupled stiffness matrix for the spring system. A continuum method of analysis usingdynamic stiffness is Used to determine the dynamic properties of the bridges .The response of thebridge deck is obtained by the response spectrum method of analysis as applied to multi-degree offreedom system which duly takes into account the quasi - static component of bridge deck vibration.The fragility analysis includes uncertainties arising due to the variation in ground motion,material property, modeling, method of analysis, ductility factor and damage concentration effect.Probability of failure of the bridge deck is determined by the First Order Second Moment (FOSM)method of reliability. A three span double plane symmetrical fan type cable stayed bridge of totalspan 689 m, is used as an illustrative example. The fragility curves for the bridge deck failure areobtained under a number of parametric variations. Some of the important conclusions of the studyindicate that (ⅰ) not only vertical component but also the horizontal component of ground motionhas considerable effect on the probability of failure; (ⅱ) ground motion with no time lag betweensupport excitations provides a smaller probability of failure as compared to ground motion with verylarge time lag between support excitation; and (ⅲ) probability of failure may considerablyincrease for soft soil condition.

Study on longitudinal wind load calculation method of cables for cable-stayed bridge

Along with the expanding of span of cable-stayed bridge,wind load becomes a more and more important controlling factor for bridge the design.A very large proportion of the wind load acting on cables has exceeded that acting on deck.There was not any detailed prescript in Chinese code for calculation of longitudinal wind load on cables due to lack of theoretical research and experiment,and conservative simplified calculation was adopted during design,which leads to conservative and uneconomical design of structures.To resolve this problem,cable force experiment was carried out during the design of Sutong Bridge.By comparing with international research results,the calculation formula of longitudinal wind drag coefficient for cables was advanced to fill the blank of bridge wind resistant code of China,and has already been adopted in the Highway Bridge Wind Resistant Design Code(JTG/T D60-01-2004)with great significance for bridge engineering.

Genetic Algorithms-based Optimization of Cable Stayed Bridges

Optimum design of cable stayed bridges depends on number of parameters. Design of Cable stayed bridge satisfying all practical constraints is challenging to the designers. Considering the huge number of design variables and practical constraints, Genetic Algorithms (GA) is most suitable for optimizing the cable stayed bridge. In the present work the optimum design is carried out by taking total material cost of bridge as objective function. During problem formulation most of the practical design variables and constraints are considered. Using genetic algorithms some parametric studies such as effect of geometric nonlinearity, effect of grouping of cables, effect of practical site constraints on tower height and side span, effect of bridge material, effect of cable layout, effect of extra-dosed bridges on optimum relative cost have been presented. Data base is prepared for new designers to estimate the relative cost of bridge.

Rolling Fatigue Test of Large-Sized UHPC Member for Cable Stayed Bridge

Recently, research strives to apply Ultra High Performance Concrete (UHPC) to large-sized structures owing to its remarkable mechanical performance and durability compared to normal concrete. The Korea Institute of Construction Technology proposed SuperBridge800, an edge girder type UHPC cable stayed bridge with central span of 800 m, through its detailed design. The bridge is designed to be erected through the connection of precast UHPC segments. The precast UHPC segment is monolithically composed of one ribbed deck slab and edge girders at each side. The connection between the precast segments is achieved by steel bars at the edge girders and by UHPC cast-in-place wet joint at the slab. Despite of the outstanding mechanical performance of UHPC, the fabrication of large-sized members is a difficult task since UHPC hardens faster than normal concrete and requires a special curing process. Therefore, the constructability of large-sized UHPC segment should be secured to achieve SuperBridge800. Besides, the performance of the connection between segments should also be guaranteed, especially in terms of the fatigue performance of the UHPC cast-in-place joint, which constitutes a weak point. To that goal, two half-scaled UHPC segments are manufactured and the constructability is examined by fabricating a large-sized UHPC member connected with respect to the design conditions. This study conducts rolling fatigue test on the so-fabricated large-sized UHPC member. Rolling fatigue test is carried out up to 2 million cycles considering actual vehicle load at each center and quarter points of the member. The test results confirm that the service limit state is satisfied.

NONLINEAR TRANSIENT RESPONSE OF STAY CABLE WITH VISCOELASTICITY DAMPER IN CABLE-STAYED BRIDGE

Taking the bending stiffness, static sag, and geometric non-linearity into consideration, the space nonlinear vibration partial differential equations were derived. The partical differential equations were discretized in space by finite center difference approximation, then the nonlinear ordinal differential equations were obtained. A hybrid method involving the combination of the Newmark method and the pseudo-force strategy was proposed to analyze the nonlinear transient response of the inclined cable-dampers system subjected to arbitrary dynamic loading. As an example, two typical stay cables were calculated by the present method. The results reveal both the validity and the deficiency of the viscoelasticity damper for vibration control of stay cables. The efficiency and accuracy of the proposed method is also verified by comparing the results with those obtained by using Runge-Kutta direct integration technique. A new time history analysis method is provided for the research on the stay cable vibration control.

Damage Detection for Long-Span Cable-Stayed Bridge

Based on the updated finite-element model of a cable-stayed bridge, this study investigates the technique of identifying damage existing in cable or girder by means of numerical simulation. The modal analysis is performed to identify the changes in modal fiequencies and curvatures caused by damage, and the static analysis is executed to detect the influence of damage on cable force. The results indicate a relatively significant decrease in frequencies of lower vertical bending modes due to the damage in cable and little change of frequencies due to damage in girder. Different sensitivities to the location of damaged cable are observed from the fiequency changes of different bending modes, which can be used to initially locate the damaged cable. The damage in either cable or girder can be further localized by the most significant change in curvature of girder. The damage occurred in a cable produces a remarkable change in force of nearby cables, whereas the damage in girder brings little change of cable forces. In addition, a pragmatic approach for localizing the damage in girder or cable is proposed based on a comprehensive utilization of the changes in frequency of vertical bending modes, modal curvature of girder, and force in cables.

Optimization of Dead Load State in Earth-Anchored Cable-Stayed Bridges

In order to determine the reasonable completed dead load state in earth-anchored cable-stayed bridges,a practical method is proposed. The method is based on the rigidly supported continuous beam method and the feasible zone method,emphasizing on the mutual effect between the self-anchored structural parts and the earth-anchored ones. Three cable-stayed bridge models are designed with the main spans of 1 400 m,including a partially earth-anchored cable-stayed bridge,a cable-stayed-suspension bridge and a fully selfanchored cable-stayed bridge,in which the C50 concrete and Q345 steel are adopted. The partially earthanchored cable-stayed bridge and the cable-stayed-suspension bridge secure lower compressive force in the girder than the fully self-anchored cable-stayed bridge by 25 percent at least. The same is for the material consumption of the whole bridge. Furthermore,the anchor volume is more than 20% lower in the partially earthanchored cable-stayed bridge than that in the cable-stayed-suspension bridge. Consequently,the practical span of cable-stayed bridges can be accordingly extended.

Technology for long cable erection of a thousand-meter scale cable-stayed bridge

In the background of the construction of Sutong Yangtze River Bridge(short as Sutong Bridge),the cable construction method and techniques of a thousand-meter scale cable-stayed bridge are introduced.Some key construction techniques,such as outspreading cable on deck,installing cable at pylon,pulling and fixing cable at the attachment with decks and cable PE sheath protection are discussed.

Numerical simulation of dynamic characteristics of a cable-stayed aqueduct bridge

In this paper, a full-scale 3-D finite element model of the Jundushan cable-stayed aqueduct bridge is established with ANSYS Code. The shell, fluid, tension-only spar and beam elements are used for modeling the aqueduct deck, filled water, cables and support towers, respectively. A multi-element cable formulation is introduced to simulate the cable vibration. The dry （without water） and wet （with water） modes of the aqueduct bridge are both extracted and investigated in detail. The dry modes of the aqueduct bridge are basically similar to those of highway cable-stayed bridges. A dry mode may correspond to two types of wet modes, which are called the in-phase （with lower frequency） and out-of-phase （with higher frequency） modes. When the water-structure system vibrates in the in-phase/out-of-phase modes, the aqueduct deck moves and water sloshes in the same/opposite phase-angle, and the sloshing water may take different surface-wave modes. The wet modes of the system reflect the properties of interaction among the deck, towers, cables and water. The in-phase wet frequency generally decreases as the water depth increases, and the out-of-phase wet frequency may increase or decrease as the water depth increases.

Semi-active control of a cable-stayed bridge under multiple-support excitations

This paper presents a semi-active strategy for seismic protection of a benchmark cable-stayed bridge with consideration of multiple-support excitations. In this control strategy, Magnetorheological (MR) dampers are proposed as control devices, a LQG-clipped-optimal control algorithm is employed. An active control strategy, shown in previous researches to perform well at controlling the benchmark bridge when uniform earthquake motion was assumed, is also used in this study to control this benchmark bridge with consideration of multiple-support excitations. The performance of active control system is compared to that of the presented semi-active control strategy. Because the MR fluid damper is a con-trollable energy- dissipation device that cannot add mechanical energy to the structural system, the proposed control strategy is fail-safe in that bounded-input, bounded-output stability of the controlled structure is guaranteed. The numerical results demonstrated that the performance of the presented control design is nearly the same as that of the active control system; and that the MR dampers can effectively be used to control seismically excited cable-stayed bridges with multiple-support excitations.

Ground motion spatial variability effects on seismic response control of cable-stayed bridges

The spatial variability of input ground motion at supporting foundations plays a key role in the structural response of cable-stayed bridges （CSBs）; therefore, spatial variation effects should be included in the analysis and design of effective vibration control systems. The control of CSBs represents a challenging and unique problem, with many complexities in modeling, control design and implementation, since the control system should be designed not only to mitigate the dynamic component of the structural response but also to counteract the effects of the pseudo-static component of the response. The spatial variability effects on the feasibility and efficiency of seismic control systems for the vibration control of CSBs are investigated in this paper. The assumption of uniform earthquake motion along the entire bridge may result in quantitative and qualitative differences in seismic response as compared with those produced by uniform motion at all supports. A systematic comparison of passive and active system performance in reducing the structural responses is performed, focusing on the effect of the spatially varying earthquake ground motion on the seismic response of a benchmark CSB model with different control strategies, and demonstrates the importance of accounting for the spatial variability of excitations.

Analysis on Deflection Characteristics of Steel Cable-Stayed Bridge

Various kinds of deflection characteristics on the steel cable-stayed bridge(Nanjing No.3 Yangtze River Bridge)are investigated by different mathematical statistical methods.Firstly,via Pearson correlation coefficient calculation,it shows good consistency between the adjacent measuring point of side span or middle span.Secondly,taking mid-span deflection as an example,the correlation analysis of deflection and temperature is conducted.They are synchronous via cross correlation coefficient calculation but not completely linear and a"hysteresis loop"phenomenon of three stages is formed.The fitting result on the monitoring data at day time is consistent with the numerical value through the application of unit temperature difference between the cable and girder and the positive temperature gradient of girder in the finite element model.And the temperature effect is considerable.Vehicle loads effect is obtained from wavelet analysis.The extracted curve can indirectly reflect the change of traffic loads.Finally,the structural damage is analyzed through the trend fusion on the deflection,cable force and visual inspection from 2006 to 2015.Relevant conclusions can provide a basis for management departments to carry out special detection.

Dynamic performance of cable-stayed bridge tower with multi-stage pendulum mass damper under wind excitations——I:Theory

In this paper, wind-induced vibration control of a single column tower of a cable-stayed bridge with a multi- stage pendulum mass damper （MSPMD） is investigated. Special attention is given to overcoming space limitations for installing the control device in the tower and the effect of varying natural frequency of the towers during construction. First, the finite element model of the bridge during its construction and the basic equation of motion of the MSPMD are introduced. The equation of motion of the bridge with the MSPMD under along-wind excitation is then established. Finally, a numerical simulation and parametric study are conducted to assess the effectiveness of the control system for reducing the wind-induced vibration of the bridge towers during construction. The numerical simulation results show that the MSPMD is practical and effective for reducing the along-wind response of the single column tower, can be installed in a small area of the tower, and complies with the time-variant characteristics of the bridge during its entire construction stage.

Conceptual Design of Hybrid Cable-Stayed Bridge with Central Span of 1000 m Using UHPC

Ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) is featured by a compressive strength 5 times higher than that of ordinary concrete and by a high durability owing to the control of the chloride penetration speed by its dense structure. The high strength characteristics of UHPC offer numerous advantages like the reduction of the quantities of cables and foundations by the design of a lightweight superstructure in the case of the long-span bridge preserving its structural performance through axial forces and structures governed by compression. This study conducted the conceptual design of a hybrid cable-stayed bridge with central span of 1000 m and exploiting 200 MPa-class UHPC. The economic efficiency of the conceptual design results of the hybrid cable-stayed bridge with central span of 1000 m and of Sutong Bridge, the longest cable-stayed bridge in the world, was analyzed.