Industrialized light-weight steel bridge concept using corrugated core steel sandwich plates

Paper in proceeding, 2016

A corrugated core steel sandwich plate is a high-performance all-steel structural element. It consists of two outer steel plates separated by a folded corrugated core plate. Connecting the three plates can be made through hybrid laser-arc welding. In bridge applications, steel sandwich bridge decks bring several benefits compared to conventional orthotropic decks; better load distribution, higher stiffness to weight ratio and a more industrialized production and construction process. This paper presents a background to the concept of steel sandwich bridge decks and comparisons are made to conventional steel bridge decks in a qualitative and quantitative manner. The results from a study on the impact of the weld joint configuration on the fatigue performance and transverse shear stiffness is presented. In addition possible applications of sandwich bridge decks are discussed based on case studies. The results show that weight saving with up to 44% can be achieved by replacing conventional orthotropic decks with steel sandwich plates.