Maintenance-free corrosion protection for steel composite bridges with rolled sections

Increasing problems in terms of damages on bridges in Germany correlated with partly massive long-term impacts on road traffic have shown how essential it is to ensure the durability of the infrastructure and thus the mobility of people as well as the exchange of goods. In particular corrosion damages can be sustainably avoided in future by alternative protection systems for steel and composite bridges. Both the hot-dip galvanizing with a layer thickness of at least 200 mu m as well as weathering steel offer crucial advantages over traditionally used coating systems considering the whole life cycle of the bridge: they require no maintenance and hence traffic interferences can be avoided. When using these systems in combination with hot-rolled sections, there are further significant advantages in making composite bridges more economical and durable.