Verstärkung orthotroper Stahlfahrbahnplatten mit Hochleistungsbetonen in Hinblick auf ausreichende Restlebensdauer

Strengthening of orthotropic steel decks using UHPC-concrete for additional at least 50 years in service.

Steel orthotropic bridge decks for slender and long spanned girder bridges were frequently built in the 60ties and 70ties of the last century in the German-speaking countries. In the design of such bridge decks only the ultimate load carrying capacity was considered, without fatigue aspects. Due to the dramatic increase of heavy traffic in the European road network, sometimes the calculated remaining fatigue life is exhausted, after only 50 years of service life. In the paper the relevant results of a research project are presented, with the challenging aim to increase the service life of such orthotropic bridge decks to at least 50 years after strengthening.