Date of Graduation

2005

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

Committee Chair

Bruce Kang

Abstract

Fiber Reinforced Polymeric (FRP) composites are being implemented as structural elements in the bridge deck construction in lieu of conventional bridge decks. In this study a 4” thick low profile FRP bridge deck module made of E-glass fiber and vinyl ester resin, having fiber volume fraction of approximately 50% and weighing about 10 lb/ft2 was developed. The focus of this study was to evaluate the structural performance of the low-profile FRP decks and determine its adequacy under AASHTO’s HS25 loading. The bridge deck module was also tested as a beam bending element with edge-wise orientation, and was structurally evaluated. The structural properties, such as stiffness and strength were obtained for the 4” deep x 24” wide multicellular FRP composite component, which can be used as a deck, and also as a beam with 24” direction as the depth direction. The failure strength and stiffness of the multicellular deck was found to be about 31 ksi and 3.8 x 106 psi respectively. The moment of inertia of the multicellular FRP composite beam of 24” depth (two decks bolted back to back) was about 2800 in4 . The experimental test results of the deck and beam were correlated with theoretical evaluations using approximate classical lamination theory. Static and fatigue response of two types of low-profile FRP bridge deck-steel stringer system was studied. The modules of one of the two decks were riveted, while the other was glued with PLIOGRIP. The riveted deck was fatigued for 1.5 million cycles and the glued deck failed prematurely after running for 495,000 cycles due to improper seating of the patch load plate. The degradation of bending rigidity was around 9% for riveted deck system and around 4.6% for glued deck system. From this study, it was concluded that the low-profile FRP bridge decks could resist AASHTO’s HS-25 type of loading with maximum stringer spacing of 48”. The lightweight, low-profile FRP bridge deck/beam modulus are being implemented on two highway bridges namely Pleasant plane road bridge in Montgomery County, OH and on Black Mills Bridge in Fredrick County, MD.

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