Vibration behaviors of a damaged bridge under moving vehicular loads

A large number of bridges were built several decades ago, and most of which have gradually suffered serious deteriorations or damage due to the increasing traffic loads, environmental effects, and inadequate maintenance. However, very few studies were conducted to investigate the vibration behaviors of a damaged bridge under moving vehicles. In this paper, the vibration behaviors of such vehicle-bridge system are investigated in details, in which the effects of the concrete cracks and bridge surface roughness are particularly considered. Specifically, two vehicle models are introduced, i.e., a simplified four degree-of-freedoms (DOFs) vehicle model and a more complex seven DOFs vehicle model, respectively. The bridges are modeled in two types, including a single-span uniform beam and a full scale reinforced concrete high-pier bridge, respectively. The crack zone in the reinforced concrete bridge is considered by a damage function. The bridge and vehicle coupled equations are established by combining the equations of motion of both the bridge and vehicles using the displacement relationship and interaction force relationship at the contact points between the tires and bridge. The numerical simulations and verifications show that the proposed modeling method can rationally simulate the vibration behaviors of the damaged bridge under moving vehicles; the effect of cracks on the impact factors is very small and can be neglected for the bridge with none roughness, however, the effect of cracks on the impact factors is very significant and cannot be neglected for the bridge with roughness.