Low-Cost Bridges
The effectiveness of the design helped KSCI earn a grant from the National Academy of Sciences to help build the Russell County structure as a demonstration. Since then KSCI has used the proven design to build bridges and bridge decks for installations in Missouri, New York and West Virginia as well as other locations in Kansas. KSCI’s design efficiency is based on a composite construction that sandwiches a core with a sine wave cross-section between
two flat facing panels. The pattern is similar to the way cardboard uses corrugation to provide higher stiffness with
less material. The big difference with KSCI is that high-strength engineered composites are used instead of paperboard.
Most KSCI bridges and decks come with a wear surface made of polymer concrete, a mixture of thermoset resin and aggregate. The aggregate specifications are provided by the state or local authority who orders the bridge. Compared to conventional Portland cement concrete or asphalt surfaces, polymer concrete has higher elongation, greater impact and abrasion resistance, and longer service life. KSCI manufactures composite bridge components by hand laying resin-impregnated fiberglass materials in an open mold. When the liquid resin cures into a solid state, FRP composite is formed in the shape of the mold. The reinforcements are chopped strand mat for the sinusoidal core and a combination of chopped strand mat and bidirectional fabrics for the flat panels. The resin and reinforcements are supplied by the Kansas City location of distributor Composites One.
Right from the start with the demonstration bridge, KSCI bridge components have been manufactured using thermoset resins from AOC. “For the demonstration project, we used three different AOC resins,” Ricker says. “One resin was for the core and face panels, another was for bonding cores and face panels together, and the third was for the polymer concrete. As we gained more experience, we’ve gone to a single resin - Vipel® F701 - to get a very good combination of processability, performance and value.”
Integral System
To create an integral system, KSCI eliminates the need for an adhesive by wet-laminating the Vipel F701 resin-impregnated cores and facing panels to each other. System integration is further enhanced by using the Vipel resin for the polymer concrete and composite components.
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