Sung Yong Park

A Sensor-Type PC Strand with an Embedded FBG Sensor for Monitoring Prestress Forces

Prestressed Concrete Wire and Strand (PC) strands are the most used materials to introduce prestress in a Pre-Stressed Concrete (PSC) structure. However, it is difficult to evaluate the final prestress force of the PC strand after prestressing or its residual prestress force after completion of the structure on site. This impossibility to assess eventual loss of prestress of the PC strand has resulted in a number of serious accidents and even in the collapse of several structures. This situation stresses the necessity to maintain the prestress force residual or after prestressing for the evaluation of the health of the concrete structure throughout its lifespan. Recently, several researchers have studied methods enabling one to verify the prestress force by inserting an optical fiber sensor inside the strand but failed to provide simple techniques for the fabrication of these devices to fulfill measurement performance from the design prestress to failure. Moreover, these methods require the additional installation of electrical resistance strain gages, displacement sensors and load cells on the outer surface of the structure for long-term precise measurement. This paper proposes a method enabling one to evaluate precisely and effectively the prestress force of the PC strand and intends to verify the applicability of the proposed method on actual concrete structures. To that end, an innovative PC strand is developed by embedding a Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) sensor in the core wire of the PC strand so as to enable short term as well as long term monitoring. The measurement performance of the developed strand is then evaluated experimentally and the reliability of the monitoring data is assessed.

Estimation of Prestress Force Distribution in the Multi-Strand System of Prestressed Concrete Structures

Prestressed concrete (PSC) is one of the most reliable, durable and widely used construction materials, which overcomes the weakness of concrete in tension by the introduction of a prestress force. Smart strands enabling measurement of the prestress force have recently been developed to maintain PSC structures throughout their lifetime. However, the smart strand cannot give a representative indication of the whole prestress force when used in multi-strand systems since each strand sustains a different prestress force. In this paper, the actual distribution of the prestress force in a multi-strand system is examined using elastomagnetic (EM) sensors to develop a method for tracking representative indicators of the prestress force using smart strands.

Design and Construction of Innovative UHPC Pedestrian Cable Stayed Bridge in Korea

This paper presents the design and construction of the first pedestrian cable-stayed bridge using ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) developed by the Korea Institute of Construction Technology (KICT). UHPC exhibits compressive strength larger than 150MPa, which enables it to resist to large compressive forces. In addition, its high resistance to tension and shear makes it possible to minimize the thickness of the cross section. Accordingly, a pedestrian cable-stayed bridge exploiting at the most the characteristics of the developed UHPC has been planned, designed, cured, placed and erected in the site of KICT. This full-scale test bed demonstrated the applicability of UHPC for cable-stayed bridge structures and allowed to derive future research topics.

Estimation of Prestress Force Distribution in Multi-Strand System of Prestressed Concrete Structures Using Field Data Measured by Electromagnetic Sensor

The recently developed smart strand can be used to measure the prestress force in the prestressed concrete (PSC) structure from the construction stage to the in-service stage. The higher cost of the smart strand compared to the conventional strand renders it unaffordable to replace all the strands by smart strands, and results in the application of only a limited number of smart strands in the PSC structure. However, the prestress forces developed in the strands of the multi-strand system frequently adopted in PSC structures differ from each other, which means that the prestress force in the multi-strand system cannot be obtained by simple proportional scaling using the measurement of the smart strand. Therefore, this study examines the prestress force distribution in the multi-strand system to find the correlation between the prestress force measured by the smart strand and the prestress force distribution in the multi-strand system. To that goal, the prestress force distribution was measured using electromagnetic sensors for various factors of the multi-strand system adopted on site in the fabrication of actual PSC girders. The results verified the possibility to assume normal distribution for the prestress force distribution per anchor head, and a method computing the mean and standard deviation defining the normal distribution is proposed. This paper presents a meaningful finding by proposing an estimation method of the prestress force based upon field-measured data of the prestress force distribution in the multi-strand system of actual PSC structures.

Static and Fatigue Behaviors of Precast FRP-Concrete Composite Deck for Cable-Stayed Bridge

The precast FRP-concrete composite deck enables a reduction of the weight by 50% compared to reinforced concrete decks owing to the composition of a FRP panel with concrete. Therefore, the application of such deck in cable-stayed bridge will reduce effectively the weight of the superstructure leading also to substantial savings of the materials required for the superstructure and substructure and, subsequently, to achieve significant improvement of the economic efficiency. In view of these advantages, a precast FRP-concrete composite deck is selected and newly designed as a deck economically applicable to cable-stayed bridge. The applicability of the deck system is verified through static and fatigue tests.

Behavior of FRP-Concrete Composite Decks with the Mechanical Connection

FRP-concrete composite deck, an innovative system, is composed of concrete in the top and FRP panel in the bottom. Bottom FRP panel can reduce self weight and improve workability. This system requires strong connection between FRP and concrete. Therefore coarse sand coating was previously applied on FRP to improve the bonding. In this study, concrete wedge method is newly introduced to enhance both vertical bond and fatigue performance. Three FRP-concrete composite deck specimens with the concrete wedges were manufactured, and static and fatigue tests were carried out. The results showed that the new FRP-concrete composite deck satisfied deflection and crack width limits set by the design codes. And the fatigue test showed that the composite deck was capable of two million load cycles under 50% of its static strength. Based on the results, it can be concluded that that this new system has outstanding mechanical and durability performance, and therefore, satisfactorily be used in designing FRP-concrete composite deck.

Reliability-Based Performance Assessment and Prediction of Tendon Corrosion in K-UHPC Bridges

Tendon corrosion reliability in KICT-ultra high performance concrete (K-UHPC) bridges is assessed and predicted considering uncertainties in flexural bending capacity and corrosion occurrence. In post-tensioning bridge systems, corrosion is a one of most critical failure mechanisms due to strength reduction by it. During the entire service life, those bridges may experience lifetime corrosion deterioration initiated and propagated in tendons which are embedded not only in normal concrete but also in K-UHPC. For this reason, the time-variant corrosion performance has to be assessed. In the absence of in-depth researches associated with K-UHPC tendon corrosion, a reliability-based prediction model is developed to evaluate lifetime corrosion performance of tendon in K-UHPC bridges. In 2015, KICT built a K-UHPC pilot bridge at 168/5~168/6 milestone on Yangon-Mandalay Expressway in Myanmar, by using locally produced tendons which post-tensioned in longitudinal and lateral ways of K-UHPC girders. For an illustrative purpose, this K-UHPC bridge is used to identify the time-variant corrosion performance.

Evaluation of Structural Performance of RC Deck Slabs by High-Strength Concrete

Lately, the high-strength concrete is often used to increase the lifespan of bridges. The benefits of using the high-strength concrete are that it increases the durability and strength. On the contrary, it reduces the cross-section of the bridges. This study conducted structural performance tests of the bridge deck slabs applying high-strength concrete. As result of the tests, specimens of bridge deck slabs were destroyed through punching shear. Moreover, the tests exposed that the high-strength concrete bridge deck slabs satisfy the flexural strength and the punching shear strength at ultimate limit state(ULS). Also, limiting deflection of the concrete fulfilled serviceability limit state(SLS) criteria. These results indicated that the bridge deck slabs designed by high-strength concrete were enough to secure the safety factor despite of its low thickness.

Numerical Analysis on Variation of Dynamic Response of Girder Bridges with Torsional Reinforcement Panels

The dynamic flexural behaviour of the railway bridge is influenced by its torsional behaviour. Especially, in the case of girder railway bridges, the dynamic response tends to amplify when the natural frequency in flexure (1 st vibration mode) is close to that in torsion (2 nd vibration mode). In order to prevent such situation, it is necessary to adopt a flexural-to-torsional natural frequency ratio larger than 120%. This study proposes a solution shifting the natural frequency in torsion to high frequency range and restraining torsion by installing concrete panels on the bottom flange of the girder so as to prevent the superposition of the responses in the girder bridge. The applicability of this solution is examined by finite element analysis of the shift of the torsional natural frequency and change in the dynamic response according to the installation of the concrete panels. The analytical results for a 30 m-span girder railway bridge indicate that installing the concrete panels increases the natural frequency in torsion by restraining the torsional behaviour and reduces also the overall dynamic response. It is seen that the installation of 100 mm-thick concrete panels along a section of 4 m at both extremities of the girder can reduce the dynamic response by more than 30%.

Governing Design Factors of GFRP-Reinforced Concrete Bridge Deck

In this study, the governing design factors of GFRP-reinforced concrete bridge deck are analyzed for typical bridges in Korea. The adopted bridge deck is a cast-in-situ concrete bridge deck for the prestressed concrete girder bridge with dimensions of 240 mm thickness and 2.75 m span length from center-to-center of supporting girders. The selected design variables are the diameters of GFRP rebar, spacings of GFRP rebars and concrete cover thicknesses, Considering the absence of the specification relating GFRP rebar in Korea, AASHTO specification is used to design the GFRP-reinforced concrete bridge deck. The GFRP-reinforced concrete bridge deck is proved to be governed by the criteria about serviceability, especially maximum crack width, while steel reinforced concrete bridge deck is governed by the criteria on ultimate limit state. In addition, GFRP rebars with diameter of 16 mm ~ 19 mm should be used for the main transverse direction of decks to assure appropriate rebar spacings.