Dynamic responses of prestressed bridge and vehicle through bridge–vehicle interaction analysis

• Impact factor is smaller for multi-span prestressed bridges at speed 30 to 40 m/s.
• Maximum vehicle accelerations provide a basis for detecting the change of prestress.
• Maximum vehicle accelerations are larger for the single-span prestressed bridges.
• Prestress eccentricity changes the vehicle-bridge interaction.

Existence of prestress in bridges affects the dynamic responses of both bridges and vehicles traveling over them. In this paper, the bridge is modeled as a continuous beam with eccentric prestress, and a half-vehicle model with 4 degrees of freedom is used to represent the vehicle passing the bridge. A new bridge–vehicle model with consideration of prestress effect is created through the principle of virtual works to investigate the continuous prestressed bridges and vehicle interaction responses. The correctness and accuracy of the model are validated with literature results and Abaqus model. Based on the created model, numerical simulations have been conducted using the Newmark integration method to perform a parametric study on effects of number of bridge span, span length, eccentricity and amplitude of prestress. It is shown that prestress has a significant effect on the maximum vertical acceleration of vehicles, which may provide a good index for detecting the change of prestress.