Steel box-girder bridge decks with curved bottom flange - Numerical studies

Nominated for the Professor Eduardo de Arantes e Oliveira Award at XII Conference on Steel and Composite Construction in Coimbra 2019
This paper presents the results of a numerical parametric study that investigated the M-V interaction behaviour of box-girder bridge deck specimens. The study made use of an advanced numerical model that was previously verified against the experimental results. Based on the numerical results and the current rules for trapezoidal box girders, new design models are proposed for predicting the bending and shear resistance of cross-sections with a curved bottom flange. Additionally, the force-based M-V interaction equation proposed by Jáger et al. [1], adopted in the new version of EN 1993-1-5 [2], was verified and slightly modified to fit this type of cross-section.