Fatigue Failure Evaluation of RC Bridge Deck in Wheel Loading Test by AE Tomography

In Japan, remediation and replacement of reinforced-concrete (RC) bridge decks consumes a major part of the road structure maintenance budget, and numerous studies have explored ways to expand the service life of the deck. Traditionally, corrective maintenance procedures and repairs have been conducted when noteworthy deterioration becomes visible to the naked eye, for example, as crack patterns on the deck surface. However, from the perspective of life cycle cost, to reduce maintenance budgets, the deterioration and damage should be evaluated before the damage reaches the surface (J Struct Eng 123: 1390–1401, 1997). Accordingly, in this study, internal damage of an RC deck due to fatigue failure is reproduced by a wheel loading testing apparatus, and the damage progress is evaluated by AE measurements as well as by elastic wave/AE tomography analysis.