Simplified Design Methods for the Diaphragms of Extradosed Bridges

Authors

  • Heng Mi

Abstract

Extradosed bridges are widely used in the construction of railway and highway bridges, the diaphragms in cable area are important components to transfer and carry loads, traditional analysis of the diaphragms relies on 3D solid finite-element method which is complicated and time consuming, so it’s necessary to develop some simple and practical methods to the design of diaphragms. In this paper, two simplified design methods for the analysis of diaphragms in cable area of extradosed bridges are introduced by only using 1D beam finite-element model instead of 3D solid finite-element model. Based on an actual project, three types of finite-element model are established to evaluate the accuracy of the proposed simplified design methods, in comparison with the traditional 3D solid finite-element analysis, the result indicates the accuracy of the simplified design methods are acceptable for engineering design purpose. The proposed methods are relatively easy to conduct and the computation time is short, can be applied to the preliminary design of similar extradosed bridges with enough accuracy and better efficiency.

Published

2020-04-30

Issue

Section

Articles