APPLICATION OF FIELD DATA IN FATIGUE LIFE ESTIMATION OF HIGHWAY BRIDGES

Non-destructive evaluation of highway bridges can effectively be conducted by monitoring and use of field stress data. This study focuses on the use of stress data compiled for bridges in the estimation of the remaining useful lives of highway bridges. The study examined several bridges located in the State of Illinois for damage evaluation purposes. The example bridges are all made up of steel girders with reinforced concrete deck slabs. For each bridge, the study examined the superstructure and investigated the potential for fatigue damage to the critical structural details of the main steel girders. The critical components investigated are steel girders with welded cover plates. The field stress range data compiled for each bridge was used along with a probabilistic method to estimate the bridge fatigue life.