Fatigue Problems in Steel Bridge Structures

Y. Edward Zhou

URS Corporation, 4 North Park Drive, Suite 300, Hunt Valley, Maryland 21030;
PH (301) 670-5461; email: ed_zhou@urscorp.com
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Abstract

Fatigue cracks initiated from various connection details are common problems in
steel bridge structures. Extensive research has been performed in the past few decades
and design/evaluation guidelines have been developed for bridge engineers.
Nevertheless, various fatigue problems are still occurring on a frequent basis with the
aging of our infrastructure systems. This paper discusses a few types of fatigue cracks
in highway steel bridges based on recent experience. The emphasis is on the subjects
where technical guidelines are not available from the current specifications. Several
cases are discussed for lessons learned from repairing fatigue cracks in bridge
connections.

Introduction

With the aging of existing steel bridges and the accumulated stress cycles under
traffic loads, fatigue cracking in steel bridge structures has become more frequent.
This paper will discuss a few most common types of fatigue cracks facing the bridge
engineers in the United States. Although these fatigue cracks have become quite
familiar to the bridge owners and engineers, efficient repair measures have yet been
developed because of the complexity and variation of the problems.

Distortion-Induced Fatigue Cracks in the Web Gap Area

For welded steel plate girders constructed prior to the late 1970’s, a common practice
was to avoid transverse welds on the tension flange. The stiffener/connection plate for
the diaphragm or cross frame is often welded to the compression flange but not
connected to the tension flange of the girder. As a result, an unsupported web gap
forms between the end of the connection plate and the tension flange of the girder.
Under the live load-induced forces in the diagrams or cross frames, the unsupported
web gap is subject to out-of-plane distortion as depicted in Figure 1. The maximum
tensile stresses caused by such distortion occur at the toes of the horizontal web-to-
flange welds and the vertical web-to-connection plate welds. These stresses have
caused horizontal cracks in the web or the web-to-flange welds and horizontal or
vertical cracks at the end of the web-to-connection plate welds. As the crack lengths
grow under cyclic loading, the directions of the cracks also change to be
perpendicular to the principal tensile stress in the local area. A typical crack resulting
from the web gap distortion in a welded plate girder is shown in Figure 2.

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 Centerline of Web Girder Top Flange

Mwg

Web Gap
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Depth, d
Diaphragm
Connection Plate
Mwg

Vd Md

Pd
Out-of-Plane Deformation

Figure1. Illustrative Distortion of the “Web Gap” Detail

Figure 2. A Cracked “Web Gap” near Bottom Flange of a Welded Plate Girder

Repair of Distortion-Induced Fatigue Cracks

There have been two general repair schemes for solving fatigue problems due to the
web gap distortion. One is to make the detail more flexible by increasing the depth of

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 the web gap. For a given out-of-plane deformation, a greater web gap depth should
result in lower local stresses at the ends, as illustrated in Figure 1. However, this
scheme works only if the increased flexibility does not cause greater out-of-plane
deformation. The other repair scheme is to make the web gap detail a stiff connection
by providing a positive connection between the girder flange and the connection
plate. The key for success of this repair scheme is to ensure the stiffness since
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precious research has indicated that a lateral movement of a few thousandth of an

inch can induce local stresses of up to 20 ksi.

Figure 3 shows a cross frame between an interior girder (left) and an exterior girder
(right) of a welded steel plate girder bridge. The original design of 1965 was such that
the cross frame connection plates were welded to the compression flange of the
exterior girders but were just “close fit” (without welding) to both flanges of the
interior girders. Fatigue cracks occurred in the web gap areas near the top flange of
the interior girders where the connection plate was not welded to the top flange. The
first repair attempt was to drill holes at the crack tips and to cut short the connection
plate to create a large web gap for reducing the local stresses (upper left corner of
Figure 3). A portion of the connected cross frame diagonal was also removed and
then reconnected to the altered connection plate.

Figure 3. Cross Frame between an Interior (left) & an Exterior Girder (right)

Some years later, fatigue cracks reinitiated and propagated beyond the holes initially
drilled. As shown in Figure 4, the big hole in the center was drilled initially to
remove the original end of the connection plate-to-web weld. The two small holes
were also drilled at the same time to remove the tips of the cracks from the web gap
detail. The two large holes at the sides were drilled years later after the propagation of
the horizontal crack from the toe of the flange-to-web weld. The vertical strain gage

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 just beyond the holes measured cyclic stresses up to 15 ksi caused by cross frame
member forces under test trucks. The high stresses are result of reduced stiffness by
the drilled holes and the cut-short connection plates in the web gap area. Stresses of
such magnitude are indications of possible continuous cracking from the weld toe.
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Figure 4. A Repaired Web Gap Detail with Cut-Short Plate and Drilled Holes

For repairs using the stiffening approach, it is important to assess the lateral force
between the end of the connection plate and the girder flange. These forces are
usually from the bridge lateral system, such as cross frames, diaphragms, or floor
beams, resulting from the differential vertical deflections of adjacent girders. A
comprehensive computer model is usually required to make reasonable predications
for the connection forces that were not considered in the original bridge design.
Retrofit designs based on underestimated lateral forces results in repairs that are not
effective to stop the cracks from growing. For bolted connections, the design and
construction of the repair must ensure stiffness, i.e., the slip-critical connection must
be used instead of the bearing type. Figure 5 shows an unsuccessful repair where
insufficient bolts were used. The crack propagation continued after the installation of
the repair. Figure 6 shows another unsuccessful repair where the Huck bolts did not
provide sufficient stiffness to completely eliminate the lateral movement of the
connection plate. The Huck bolts provide the ease of construction by installing the
bolts without removing the concrete above the girder flange. However, the nature of
such bolts and the surface conditions do not warrant a non-slip connection although
the bearing capacity may satisfy the strength requirement.

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Figure 5. A Repair with Insufficient Bolts

Figure 6. A Repair with Huck Bolts with Insufficient Stiffness

Fatigue Cracks vs. Global Structural Behavior

Successful repair for fatigue cracks requires a good understanding of the structural
behavior to identify the driving force for the localized stress concentration or

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 distortion. Fatigue cracks in connections are often results of member interactions of
the global behavior that were not properly considered in the original design. Figure 7
shows a cracked stringer-to-floor beam connection where the connection plate was
not connected to the bottom flange of the floor beam. Fatigue cracks initiated from
the web gap area between the lowest bolt on the connection angle and the bottom
flange due to the distortion of the floor beam web. The bridge is a multiple-span
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continuous steel Wichert girder bridge, as shown in Figure 8.

Stringer

Floor Beam

Girder

Figure 7. Fatigue Cracks from “Web Gap” at Stringer-Floorbeam Connection

The superstructure is a stack-up system consisting of the deck, stingers, floor beams,
and main girders. Although the bridge was designed and constructed as a non-
composite structure, the components of the superstructure tend to act compositely in
the global bending under the live load. As a result, longitudinal shear forces develop
between the floor system components under the primary bending. The longitudinal
shear between the stringers and the floor beams causes the distortion of the floor
beam web near the bottom flange due to the lack of a positive connection. Such
longitudinal shear is the driving force of the web distortion and the fatigue cracks. A
computer model was established to analyze the global response of the bridge
superstructure to the live load. The model generated forces for the design of repair
connections that are to transmit the longitudinal shear between the stringer and the

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 floor beam bottom flange. Retrofit connections were designed and installed between
the bottom flange of the stringer and the bottom flange of the floor beam to take the
longitudinal shear without causing distortion of the floor beam web. Figure 9 and
Figure 10 show the retrofit connections for the exterior and interior floor beams,
respectively.
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Figure 8. Overview of Bridge Spans

Figure 9. Retrofit on Interior Stringer-Floor Beam Connection

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Figure 10. Retrofit on Exterior Stringer-to-Floor Beam Connection

Figure 11 shows a connection between the lower-deck floor beam and the bottom
chord of a double-deck steel truss bridge as shown in Figure 12. Fatigue cracks
developed in the web of the floor beam just beyond the end of the top flange, marked
in Figure 11. Details of the fatigue cracks are depicted in Figure 13. While the
flame-cut opening just beyond the end of the flange is definitely a bad detail with
very poor fatigue resistance, the driving force was attributed to the global behavior of
the truss and the floor system consisting of the deck, stringers and floor beams.

Cracked
Area

Figure 11. The Floor Beam-to-Truss Connection

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Figure 12. Overview of Double-Deck Steel Truss Bridge

Figure 13. Fatigue Cracks around the End of Floor Beam Top Flange

Field tests were performed to measure the strains around the cracked area and the
relative longitudinal displacement between the flange and the truss. Measurements
were made under both controlled test vehicles and the regular traffic at different
locations with respect to the deck expansion joint.

For the floor beams mid-way between the deck expansion joints, in-plane bending
was found the primary behavior of the end connection. Longitudinal out-of-plane
displacement was found very small and the magnitudes of stresses were also low.

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 For the connections near the expansion joint, out-of-plane behavior dominates since
the strains on opposite faces of the web were measured essentially equal in magnitude
and opposite in sign. The magnitudes of the stresses were found much higher than the
in-plane stresses in the connections of the mid-span floor beam. The relative
longitudinal displacement between the floor beam flange and the truss was measured
in the order of 0.010 to 0.015 inch. The responses of the strain gages and the
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displacement transducer corresponded to the truck crossing over the truss spans rather
than the axle crossing over the instrumented floor beam. This indicates that the
distress in the cracked area is caused by the global behavior of the truss-floor system
instead of the in-plane flexing of the floor beam under the axle loading. Additionally,
this also indicated that the vehicles on both decks contribute to the out-of-plane
distortion of the connections. Under the live load, the entire truss-floor system
responds primarily in longitudinal bending as a composite structure. Such global
bending results in longitudinal shear between the truss system and the floor system.
The transmission of the longitudinal shear causes stress concentration at the end of
the floor beam top flange as shown in Figure 11. The existence of the flame-cut
openings makes the situation worse since they have very poor fatigue resistance.

The repair of such problem can be based on either the stiffening approach or making
the floor beam to truss connection more flexible. The development of repair details
from either method requires a thorough analysis to ensure a reduced level of local
stresses.

Conclusions

Fatigue cracks in existing bridge connections are often results of localized stresses or
distortions that are beyond required considerations of bridge design. In routine bridge
designs, members and connections were designed individually for their primary load
response, i.e., bending and shear, upon specification loading and distribution factors.
The interacting forces and deformations between structural components due to the
global behavior of the structure were often neglected. Secondary effects, e.g., forces
in cross frame and diaphragm members in straight bridges, have been found to be one
of the main causes for fatigue cracks if the connections were not detailed properly.
Lessons should be learned from observed cracks in existing bridges and
recommendations made to new bridge designs for proper detailing.

Successful repairs for fatigue cracks require accurate identification of the driving
force for localized stress concentration or distortion. A thorough understanding of the
structural behavior can be obtained from examining the global structural behavior and
the interaction between connected components. These interactions were usually
neglected in the original design which considered one member or connection at a
time.

10

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