Best Practices for Road Weather Management Version 2.0
Title:
Modeling the Temperature Behavior of Concrete Bridge Decks as a Function of Rapid Change in Air Temperature Using Finite Element Analysis
Abstract:
This paper presents a temperature behavior model of a typical concrete bridge deck as a function of a rapid change in air temperature using finite element analysis for nighttime (no solar radiation) conditions. The temperature behavior of the concrete bridge deck and of concrete blocks of various sizes was used to model different warming and cooling temperature profiles. This paper reports on the modeling of the temperature behavior of a typical concrete bridge deck as a function of a rapid change in air temperature using finite element analysis for night time (no solar radiation) conditions. The temperature behavior of the concrete bridge deck is modeled for different warming and cooling temperature profiles. A six inch (152 mm*152mm*152mm) concrete cube referred to as a Bridge Deck Simulator was also used to investigate its temperature behavior along with the bridge deck temperature behavior to see if such a block could be used to predict fairly close the temperature behavior of the bridge deck. It was found that the bridge deck simulator does cool and warm much faster than the actual bridge deck and does not closely simulate the temperature behavior of the bridge deck. Additional simulations were conducted with larger concrete blocks and it was found that the temperature behavior of a concrete cube with a size of 24 inches (609 mm) almost exactly matches the temperature behavior of the bridge deck.
Source(s):
Transportation Research Board (TRB) 86th Annual Meeting, Ohio University, Ohio Research Institute for Transportation and the Environment. For an electronic copy of this resource, please direct your request to WeatherFeedback@dot.gov.
Date: 2007
Author:
Zwahlen, Gowaikar, Suravaram
Keywords:
Air temperature
Pavement temperature
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