Steel-concrete composite bridge deck slab with profiled sheeting

This paper presents an experimental study of a steel-concrete composite bridge deck slab with profiled sheeting and perfobond shear connectors. Two full-scale deck slab specimens cast onto three concrete blocks were fabricated and tested under static loading to examine the ultimate load-carrying capacity of the proposed deck slab system under sagging and hogging bending actions. The ultimate behaviour of the full-scale deck slab specimens is also compared with that of simply supported deck specimens under hogging bending only. In addition, the load-deflection behaviour of the proposed deck system is compared with that of a reinforced concrete (RC) deck slab. The test results indicate that the ultimate load-carrying capacity of the proposed deck system is at least 220% greater than that of the RC deck system and that the deck weighs about 23% less than the RC deck system. The paper summarizes the test results, findings, and recommendations for future study. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.