Dynamic testing of a prestressed concrete bridge and numerical verification

In this paper, different dynamic tests carried out on bridge B15 over the highway E19 connecting Brussels and Antwerpen in Belgium are described. Two Different excitation types are considered: a drop weight and ambient vibrations due to the traffic under and over the bridge. Finite element model is constructed to support and verify the dynamic measurements. The current measurements are a part of a research project for diagnostic inspection and detection of damages for bridges. By repeating the dynamic test after a certain time of use, the bridge's dynamic parameters such as natural frequencies, mode shapes and modal damping ratios could be used to detect and quantify damages. The modal parameters are extracted from the response time series using the data dependent system (DDS) approach. Good correlation between the finite element simulation and the experiments is obtained.