Sustainable, maintenance-free and lighter beams for stronger Swedish infrastructure

Research Project, 2019 – 2022

Purpose and goal: The aim is to develop and verify a new bridge concept that incorporates lightweight steel girders with corrugated webs to replace conventional stiffened steel girders. The corrugated webs give considerable saving in material and production costs. Additional weight saving is made possible by the use of high-strength stainless steel. The aim is at least 20% reduction in material and weight through the combination of the efficient corrugated web concept and the high-strength stainless steel. The life cycle cost of a bridge built with this concept will also be reduced by at least 20%. Expected results and effects: The corrugation gives significantly fewer stiffeners on the beam, which gives great savings in production time and material. The thinner web leads to additional material saving, as well as faster welding with less heat supply, residual stresses and deformations. All in all, it provides cost savings and less environmental impact. More positive effects are that the beams can be designed for increased stability, load bearing capacity and longer fatigue life. In addition to thinner web, duplex stainless steel also provides maintenance-free beams. Approach and implementation: The three-year project is divided into several work packages: technical specifications, design, production of beams for testing, numerical modeling, documentation of the technical processes, dissemination of knowledge and reporting. The participants are owner and customers, bridge consultants, material manufacturers, welding and bridge manufacturers, and an industry organization with a large network. Such a broad consortium makes research and development work reflect real needs, and also provides for the results to be quickly implemented in future bridge projects.