Vehicular Collision Performance Evaluation of Concrete-Filled Steel Tubular Piers Designed According to Current Codes in the US, Europe, and China

Abstract

Current bridge codes in the US, Europe, and China specify vehicular collision loads for the design of piers. However, the performance of piers designed according to current codes in the three countries or regions is unknown yet. This paper presents a performance evaluation of concrete-filled steel tubular (CFST) piers subjected to vehicle collision. Before the evaluation, bridge specimens with a single CFST pier were designed in accordance with current bridge and structural codes in the three countries or regions, respectively. Then, a detailed finite-element (FE) model for simulating a truck collision with a CFST pier was developed and validated. By comparison with seven simplified FE models, the detailed FE model was further confirmed to be employed for the evaluation. In the evaluation, the effects of current codes in the three countries or regions, whether or not the vehicular collision load is considered, two pier heights (i.e., 6 and 12 m), two truck weights (i.e., 20 and 40 tons), and three impact speeds (i.e., 60, 100, and 140 km/h) on the performance of CFST piers were investigated. The evaluation results indicated that when a CFST pier in seismic zones is designed to resist vehicle collision according to current codes in the US and China, it only needs to meet the requirements of seismic design without additional consideration of the vehicular collision load. Moreover, a preliminary application condition should be added for the vehicular collision load specified by the current bridge code in Europe, that is, when the truck weight is more than 20 tons and/or the pier height is lower than 12 m.