HIGH-PRECISION CALCULATION METHOD FOR CONFIGURATION OF COMPLETED SUSPENSION BRIDGES WITH PIN-CONNECTED CABLE CLAMPS

Since the consideration on the saddles and clamps is not comprehensive enough in existing methods, a high-precision shape-finding method of the completed suspension bridges is proposed. This method takes the frictional effect and contact conditions between the main cable and saddles into account. According to the segmental catenary equation, the closure condition and the mechanical equilibrium relationship of the main cable at the saddle, the objective functions of mid-span and side-span systems of the main cable and saddles are derived respectively. The target configuration of a suspension bridge can be calculated by solving these objective functions using the Nelder-Mead algorithm, and then the fabrication lengths of hanger steel wires and the unstressed lengths of main cables can be credibly obtained because the influence of pin-connected cable clamps is considered into the shape-finding calculation adaptively. Finally, taking the Sunxi River Bridge as an example, the validity of this method is verified by the comparison between the calculation results and corresponding design ones of this bridge.