& The 5th Asia-Pacific Conference on Fiber Reinforced Polymers in Structures (APFIS-2015)
Joint Conference, 14-16 December 2015, Nanjing, China
Keywords: Anchoring system, CFRP (Carbon Fiber-Reinforced Polymer), Ground anchor, Grout,
RPC (Reactive Powder Concrete), Tendon
ABSTRACT
A large-scale CFRP-based ground anchor system was developed and applied beneath the side hangers
in the Aizhai Bridge. This is a suspension bridge with main span of 1,176 m located in Hunan, China.
In this paper, design and construction of the ground anchor system is introduced. The system overall
lock-off load as a superposition of seven ground anchors is up to 7,200 kN. Each ground anchor uses
Carbon Fiber-Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) as the tendon, and Reactive Powder Concrete (RPC) grout
as the bond medium in both above-ground anchor head and below-ground anchor part. The system is
currently fulfilling its intended purpose as a component of the bridge structure.
1. PROJECT DESCRIPTION
The Aizhai Bridge, a long-span suspension bridge with a main span of 1,176 m, located in west
Hunan, China, was a critical part of the highway connecting Hunan and Chongqing. The towers of
bridge stood on top of the mountains, while its steel truss girders were connected to tunnels drilled
through the mountains. In order to reduce the stress in the main cables and to increase the structural
stiffness, several pairs of special side-hangers were used, as shown in Fig.1. Unlike the ordinary
hangers that support stiffened truss girders in a suspension bridge, these special side-hangers were
anchored into the ground. A corresponding large-scale ground anchor system was needed to handle the
high tensile capacity under the special side-hangers.
The location of the ground anchor beneath the side hangers was on top of a steep hillside. The rock
at the spot mainly consisted of lightly disintegrated limestone with developed fractures and watereroded grooves, as shown in Fig.2. Therefore, the ground anchors beneath the special hangers should
have outstanding durability and efficiency. Frequently-used ground anchors consisting of ordinary
steel tendon and cement grout cannot fulfill these purposes. On the one hand, the conventional
materials face a serious problem of poor durability. They are vulnerable to corrosion attack in
aggressive environments [1], especially in the water-rich mountain area where the bridge is
constructed. This problem makes the conventional ground anchor incompatible with the overall bridge
for long-term use. On the other hand, due to the poor performance of conventional materials, the
below-ground length of ground anchor has to be long enough for anchoring tendons. Since the local
below-ground geological condition is poor, the longer depth demands much more complex works to
improve the condition before installation, and it also increases the costs of material and construction.
Fig.1 Side hangers and ground anchor system in the Aizhai Bridge, China
The 12th International Symposium on Fiber Reinforced Polymers for Reinforced Concrete Structures (FRPRCS-12)
& The 5th Asia-Pacific Conference on Fiber Reinforced Polymers in Structures (APFIS-2015)
Joint Conference, 14-16 December 2015, Nanjing, China
fasteners and uses RPC as the bond medium. In the below-ground part, the configuration is similar to
that of traditional tension-type rock bolts, and RPC grout is also used as the bond medium to anchor
CFRP tendons within the fixed length. Spacers installed at regular intervals along the below-ground
tendons help keeping the minimum space among multiple tendons. In addition, an innovative terminal
unit called guide-anchorage combination capsule is designed at the bottom of the bolt. During the
insertion of the rock bolt, the unit works as a guiding cap with a conical head to prevent damage to the
tendons or the borehole wall. Meanwhile, the configuration of the unit is similar to the above-ground
anchorage with RPC grouted inside, and it can provide CFRP tendons with an efficient anchoring
force. If debonding were to happen within the below-ground fixed length, the tension would transfer to
the embedded terminal unit, and the rock bolt would turn into a pressure-type bolt. This design
provides safety margin for the below-ground anchoring system.
performance at the rod-grout interface [8], the much higher strength of RPC brought improved
anchoring capacities for CFRP tendons.
2.3 Ground anchor system beneath the hanger
According to the design of Aizhai Bridge, the overall lock-off load for ground anchors beneath
either side of the hanger was up to 7,200 kN. Therefore, a group of seven ground anchors including
one N1-type anchor, and six N2-type anchors, were selected to form the ground anchor system.
Figure 5 shows the lay-out of the ground anchor system on the anchor base plate. The design lock-off
load Po of N1 and N2 ground anchors was 2100 kN and 850 kN, respectively, so 24 and 9 CFCC rods
were selected as the tendon. The tendon overall capacity Pr as a summation of all 24 and 9 rods was
equal to 4,656 kN and 1,746 kN, respectively, and the lock-off load Po was less than 0.50 times the
tendon capacity Pr.
For a bond-type anchoring system, the key parameter of bond length is determined by the bond
strength at the interfaces. In the new ground anchor, the bond length within the anchorage is
determined by the bond strength at the CFCC-RPC interface, while the below-ground fixed length is
determined by the bond strength at both the CFCCRPC interface and the RPCrock interface.
Considering the provisions of ground anchor standard [9], in practice, the above-ground anchor head
of N1 and N2 was designed with a bond length of 0.5 m and 0.4 m and a much longer below-ground
fixed length of 8 m, 6 m was selected to provide the large-tonnage anchor system with an additional
safety margin. The below-ground free length was selected to avoid the wedge-shaped failure of the
rock mass under tension. The free length of N1 was 12 m, while two types of N2 (i.e., N2-1 and N2-2)
were designed with free lengths of 11 m and 10 m, in order to transfer the tension to the rock at
different depth. The diameters of the holes were determined to provide enough grout cover to the
below-ground CFRP tendons. The typical dimensions of ground anchors are summarized in Table 1.
Above-ground
anchorage length
N1
N2-1
N2-2
0.74
0.56
0.56
Anchorage
bond
length
0.5
0.4
0.4
Below-ground
free length
Below-ground
fixed length
Depth of
borehole
Borehole
diameter
12
11
10
8
6
6
21
18
17
0.19
0.15
0.15
The 12th International Symposium on Fiber Reinforced Polymers for Reinforced Concrete Structures (FRPRCS-12)
& The 5th Asia-Pacific Conference on Fiber Reinforced Polymers in Structures (APFIS-2015)
Joint Conference, 14-16 December 2015, Nanjing, China
bond-type anchorage tube and put into hot curing. All fourteen rock bolts including two N1, eight N21 and four N2-2 bolts were prepared as the assemblies with bond-type anchorages at both ends of
CFRP tendons, as shown in Fig.6. The properties of RPC grout in anchorages were tested using cubes
70.7-mm in side and the 3-day strength of RPC under hot curing reached 120.3 MPa.
Before being transported to the project site, all rock bolts were pre-stressed under 1.2 times the
service lock-off loads to verify the reliability of the prefabricated anchorages as a method of product
inspection. The tendon-anchorage assemblies were put into a long trench for tensile tests as shown in
Fig.7. During the tests, the load was monitored by a large-tonnage load cell while the anchor
displacement was measured by linear variable displacement transducers (LVDTs). All fourteen rock
bolts showed capacities more than 1.2 times the lock-off loads, and the measured residual anchor
displacements after unloading were less than 0.1 mm. The prefabricated bond-type anchorages were
proven reliable.
allow the hydraulic jack to be released. In this way, the design lock-off load of each ground anchor
was achieved.
[2]
[3]
[4]
The 12th International Symposium on Fiber Reinforced Polymers for Reinforced Concrete Structures (FRPRCS-12)
& The 5th Asia-Pacific Conference on Fiber Reinforced Polymers in Structures (APFIS-2015)
Joint Conference, 14-16 December 2015, Nanjing, China
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
[9]