Robustness of prestressed concrete bridges

This thesis focusses on robustness of prestressed concrete bridges considering the main issues of designing and maintaining prestressed concrete bridges. Various construction methods of prestressed concrete bridges are shortly mentioned, and their main hazards and exposures of prestressed concrete are analysed and discussed. Robustness is rele-vant for design. Especially hazards, which have been identified only recently or not even known yet must play an important role in each design. A clear definition of robustness regarding bridges is presented. Aspects of robustness in general are transferred to ro-bustness of prestressed concrete bridges. Approaches for implementing robustness are discussed and compared with the current state of standards and guidelines. Methods to inspect prestressed concrete bridges, especially to inspect the tendons and ducts, are presented with their shortcomings. A typical hazard for prestressed concrete bridges is the damage of tendons. A finite element method analysis determines the deformation behaviour and edge stresses of prestressed concrete bridges in case of broken tendons. Various scenarios of broken ducts are presented. The functionality of the FEM model is evaluated by comparing moment diagrams of the FEM model and the pre-dimensioning according to the Eurocode. Finally, it can be concluded, that robustness can still be con-sidered as an important issue that needs further research. Thus, for implementation in design and for evaluation of robustness of prestressed concrete bridges always the sim-ultaneous use of different methods will be necessary