Investigation of ultra high performance concrete piles for integral abutment bridges

The American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) recently calls for increasing service life of bridges and optimizing structural systems. To extend its service life, this paper focuses on using an advanced Ultra High Performance Concrete (UHPC) as an alternative material for integral abutment bridge pile foundations. A parametric analysis was performed to understand the effects of key parameters in the performance of the UHPC piles. Results from this study provided the necessary technical background for selecting a test site and designing a field test for the UHPC pile as well as for future field monitoring of UHPC pile. A series of field testing was conducted to evaluate the behaviors of two 230-mm, H-shaped, UHPC test piles (i.e., P3 and P4), driven in clayey silt to silty clay, as well as a structural splice on P4 during pile installation, vertical, and lateral load tests. The field test results confirm that UHPC piles have exceeded the target axial and lateral capacities, sufficient driving resistance, and adequate performance of the splice. The analytical and experimental results provided the technical background knowledge of using UHPC and established the basis for more future research that would consider other influential factors.