A SUBSTRUCTURE FRONTAL TECHNIQUE FOR CANTILEVER ERECTION ANALYSIS OF CABLE-STAYED BRIDGES

A substructure-frontal technique for the analysis of the sequence of planar partial structures which arise during the cantilever erection of a cable-stayed bridge is presented. A computer code which implements the static analysis for such sequences is described. A forward process of substructure assembly is combined with a frontal elimination of condensable degrees of freedom in such a way that the reduced stiffness matrix for each partial structure is stored and easily accessible for disassembly analysis or for investigation of alternative erection sequences. Cable and P-DELTA nonlinearities, and the discrete steps in the assembly or disassembly of any individual substructure are included. The program is designed for implementation on an AT-type microcomputer and graphically displays result at all stages of the erection process.