TYPES OF BEARINGS IN BRIDGES

DO YOU KNOW WHAT ARE THE TYPES OF BEARINGS IN BRIDGES?

Bridge bearings are structure equipment or devices that are installed between bridge substructures or superstructures. The bearings are used to transfer the applied load on the bridge, including earthquake load, wind load, traffic load, etc. Bridge bearings are also responsible for the relative movements between the superstructure and substructure. For example, rotation and translational movements in horizontal or transverse directions.

1.????Sliding Bearings for Bridges

Sliding bearing consist of two metal plates, commonly stainless-steel plates, that slide relative to each other and hence makes room for translational movement and lubricating material between them

2.????Rocker and Pin Bearings for Bridge Structures

Rocker is an expansion bearing composed of curved surface at the bottom, which accommodate translational movement and a pin at the top makes room for rotation movement .Pin bearing is a fixed bearing that make room for rotation movement through the application of steel pin. It has similar structure and component like rocker bearing apart from the bottom of pin bearing which is flat and fixed to the concrete pier

3.????Roller Bearings for Bridges

Roller bearing can be used in the construction of reinforced concrete and steel bridge structure. There are two main configurations including single roller bearing which is composed of one roller placed between two plates and multiple roller bearing that consist of several rollers installed between two plate

4.????Elastomeric Bearings for Bridge Structures

It consists of elastomer manufactured from synthetic or natural rubber and can take both translation and rotation movements through elastomer deformation. The ability of elastomer to carry large vertical loads is because of reinforcement provision that prevents lateral bulging of elastomer. There are number of elastomeric bearing pads classified based on types of reinforcements used. For example, steel reinforced, plain, fiberglass reinforced and cotton duck reinforced elastomeric bearing pads

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These are the basic types of the bearings that are commonly used in bridges there are few other types like pot bearings, disk bearing and spherical bearings.

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