Stopper-Bearing System – A Solution to Displacement Control of Bridge Decks

Abstract

Bridges play an important role in society, especially during the post-earthquake period that enables emergency vehicles and traffic for safe egress and ingress to minimize the loss of property and life. However, some past earthquakes have resulted in large horizontal displacements on the superstructure that have lead to unseating of bridge spans and unexpected pounding forces that damaged critical components such as bearings and anchor bolts. To this end, a new bearing system, referred to as a stopperbearing system (SBS), is proposed as one solution to address the vulnerability of bridge bearings and other components. The horizontal displacement of a deck can be limited to a desired range using the SBS. The nonlinear load-deformation behavior of the SBS is obtained from ABAQUS and used to define the SBS within reinforced concrete analytical bridge models developed in SAP2000, which are subjected to the 1999 Chi- Chi, Taiwan earthquake ground motion (1.01g - E-W component and 0.43g - N-S component). The results from the nonlinear time history analyses show that the SBS is effective in limiting bridge deck displacements and pounding effects. Preliminary analytical modeling of the SBS shows promise as a solution to displacement control of bridge decks for overall enhancement of bridge performance during seismic events.