Field Measurements of Old Brick Culvert Slip Lined with Corrugated Steel Culvert

Thousands of culverts in the highway and railway system are in various states of deterioration, ranging from minor serviceability problems to serious functional and safety problems. One of the most effective ways to restore an old culvert to a functional condition is slip lining, the process of lining an old culvert with a new prefabricated one. Field measurements carried out on a 100-year-old brick culvert in Poland slip lined with a corrugated steel plate culvert (CSPS) are described. The new steel culvert is a pipe arch with a span of 4.26 m and height of 2.95 m. The steel culvert was assembled inside the old brick culvert without stopping traffic on the road. The space between the old culvert and the new steel culvert was filled with concrete with a compressive strength of 15 MPa. The old brick culvert was instrumented to measure strains under test load. The new steel culvert was instrumented to measure strains during the backfilling and test load. Earth pressure cells were installed in the foundation below the steel culvert to measure the pressure of the CSPS onto the subsoil. A truck with a total weight of 321 kN was used for the test load. The measured strains during test load were recorded when the truck was placed at various locations. Measurements show interaction between the old and new culvert. The redistribution of stresses that can indicate strengthening of the brick culvert was observed. Long-term measurements were taken 1 year (2001) and about 3 years (2003) after the slip lining was installed. The structure was also analyzed with the finite element method (FEM). The stress distribution obtained from the 2003 test is similar to the distribution obtained from the finite element method.