Monitoring fatigue life in concrete bridge deck slabs

Concrete bridge deck slabs are the most common form of bridge deck construction in short and medium span bridge structures in North America. Understanding and monitoring the condition of these bridge decks is an important component of a bridge management strategy. Progressive deterioration due to fatigue occurs in concrete decks due to the large number of cycles of heavy wheels loads and normally manifests itself as the progressive growth of cracks in the top and underside of the deck slab. While some laboratory fatigue testing programs have been reported in the literature, there is very little information on proposed techniques to monitor this phenomenon. This paper discusses the issue of how fatigue monitoring may be included as part of a structural health monitoring system for bridges. The paper draws upon previously published experimental results to identify the main characteristics of fatigue damage and structural response for concrete bridge deck slabs. Several means of monitoring this response are then evaluated and monitoring methods are proposed. A specific field structure monitoring program is used to illustrate the application of the concept. The cases study examines several sensor systems and discusses the various limitations and needs in this area. The results are of interest to both the general area of structural health monitoring as well as fatigue monitoring specifically.