Analysis of local effects of mechanical solicitations on stay cables : BENDING of an HELICAL WIRE in CONTACT with a CORE WIRE

ABSTRACT

The definition of fatigue loading programmes for cables used in the field of civil engineering requires a deep understanding of their mechanical behaviour. ln order to specify, in fatigue testing programs, the mechanical conditions of solicitations inducing a considered state of damage, one needs to describe, at the wire level, local effects of simple or compound general solicitations . This approach should permit a better understanding of local mechanical effects of loading solicitations on stayed cables used in cable stayed bridges, as for example in the free bending problem at the anchorages level. Even seven wire strands, the simplest structure in cables, which are commonly used for stayed cables show a complex mechanical behaviour. A wire-core interaction model describing the interwire contact as a tangentially loaded Hertzian contact problem is presented. The theoretical predictions are confronted with previous experimental results, thus enabling the analysis of the effects of the solicitations on a staying cable.

Author(s): Brevet, lng. ECL. P.; Siegert, lng. TPE. D