Railroad Bridge Analysis and Rating

[jascia1919]

Hi,

My company recently got some projects for railroad bridge inspection, rating and analysis.

I can barely find references. Anyone knows where can I find examples? Thanks a lot.

 

[ADB]

Congratulations on the new contract. My company does a lot of that type of work. Here is a good book for a design reference:

http://www.amazon.com/Design-Modern-Steel-Railway-Bridges/dp/1420082175/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323312396&sr=8-1

Inspections differ between RR company. Here are some federal safety standards regarding inspections:

www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2010-07-15/pdf/2010-16929.pdf

Do you have any type of structural analysis software? We use MDX software for steel bridges.

Best wishes.

 

[jascia1919]

Hi, Thank you so much for the response.

We used Merlin Dash and Staad for steel bridge analysis. However they cannot handle any railway code related design.

Merlin Dash has code checking for AASHTO, it is very handy for highway bridges but not railway bridges.

I need to figure out rating for different types of railroad bridges such as through girder, truss, railtop, concrete deck, prestress beam, stone arch and concrete arch.

Do you also know any references for concrete or arch railroad bridges? Thanks a lot.

 

[jascia1919]

Also is MDX specialized in railway bridge design/rating? Thanks.

 

[ADB]

In MDX it allows you to create your own live load pattern. You simply use the model given in AREMA. I have a Mathcad sheet that performs all of the stress checks with the loads from MDX output. Most RR bridges are simple spans so they aren't that difficult to analyze. If you are analyzing substructure that is a different animal. Have you worked with RR bridges before? AREMA is a must have if you aren't familiar with it already.

 

[jascia1919]

So it is pretty much the same. We also input customer live load in Merlin Dash to get the live load results.

We had some work with Railroad before but mostly inspection and rating of overpass bridges using highway loads.

It is a good opportunity to really get familiar with AREMA now. There are several bridges (around 10 different types) to be analyzed/rated.

If there is any specific problem I will let you know. Thanks a lot.