High Performance Joints for Concrete Bridge Applications

A new concept for high performance connections between prefabricated concrete elements in bridges has been investigated at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. The goal has been to design a joint that makes the surrounding elements continuous, but still a small joint that is easy and fast to produce, thus rendering the joint extremely suitable for use in industrial bridge concepts. A special steel fibre-reinforced, high performance concrete is used in the joint. Several laboratory tests have been conducted as well as finite element (FE) analysis, confirming very satisfactory performance of the joint concept. A brief presentation of the concept and the laboratory test is given, with evaluations of the finite element analysis.