Assessment and full scale failure test of a steel truss bridge

Large amount of resources has been invested in maintaining existing infrastructure. Several of thesestructures are now becoming old and do not meet the requirements of today or are reaching the endof their lifecycle. It is not possible to replace all of these structures that are deemed or are about tobe deemed obsolete, due to high cost and environmental impacts.One way to keep these structures in use for a longer time is innovative and intelligent assessment ofthe actual state of stress and behaviour. In such cases, using structural health monitoring to assessthe structure might be an efficient way to extend the life of the structure.This paper will describe a unique monitoring program over two similar 33 m long steel trussbridges situated in Sweden. One of these bridges, Aby River, had a regulated axle load of 25 tonsand was tested to failure in 2013. The other bridge, Rautasjokk, has a regulated axle load of 30 tonswhich will be upgraded to 32.5 tons and will be in use for the coming years.The monitoring program was performed as; monitoring of the bridge over Aby river when it wasstill in service. After replacement the old bridge was moved and tested under static loads to assessboundary conditions and state of stress. Parts of this bridge were then disassembled to be tested formaterial properties and fatigue capacity. A theoretical assessment of the Rautasjokk bridge was thenperformed based on the conclusions from the measurements on the Aby bridge. Finally the plan isto verify findings by performing measurements on live loading for the Rautasjokk bridge in servicelimit state.The aim for this project is to verify the continuous safety for the Rautasjokk bridge by using inputfrom tests performed at both bridges.Godkänd; 2015; 20150218 (andbra)