Advisor
Simos Gerasimidis
Publication Date
2020
Abstract
The work conducted for this project involves an experimental assessment of the Massachusetts Department of Transportation’s (MassDOT) existing procedure for determining the resistance of a corroded steel girder end when load rating a bridge. Three steel girders with significant corrosion developed over a 79-year service life were obtained from a recently rehabilitated bridge and loaded to determine the girders corroded resistance. A testing rig was designed in the UMass Amherst Brack Structural Testing Laboratory to both apply a shear dominated load to the corroded girder and withstand the developed lateral loads throughout the analysis. Reaction force data obtained from the load testing was compared against the corroded web factored resistance determined from the MassDOT LRFD Bridge Design Manual. Resistances were under predicted by 75% for specimen 1, 37% for specimen 2 and the manual predicted no resistance for specimen 3. Lastly influences for the discrepancies between manual resistance and experimental resistance are determined.