Bridges
Bridges and viaducts form an essential part of a country's local and national infrastructure and its economy
Our bridge-building legacy
Hoechst Bridge,
Germany
DYWIDAG's bridge-building legacy began in the 1880s when son and father-in-law, Dyckerhoff and Widmann, developed their cement factory into a construction company specializing in bridge engineering technology.
In 1927, the Alsleben (Germany) arch-bridge was the first-ever structure to feature a prototype DYWIDAG bar post-tensioning system. Since that date, DYWIDAG has continued to improve its systems—in line with the growing demands of modern construction technology.
Today, our extensive portfolio of bridge construction includes highway and railway bridges and stay cable and arch bridges, all erected using different methods.
Bridge post-tensioning
Our engineers specialize in the configuration of post-tensioning systems for new and existing bridges. We offer a complete product range of bonded, unbonded, and external strand, wire and bar post-tensioning systems—and stay-cable technologies.
Our research and development combine the highest standards of safety and reliability with economic efficiency.
With worldwide production facilities, we can react to local market needs with flexibility—and we're driving automation with the prefabrication of post-tensioning tendons.
Using technology for inspection and monitoring
Safe bridges are always under surveillance. Our engineers can configure or retrofit smart systems with advanced monitoring schemes to track and model structural and environmental phenomena across entire bridge structures.
And we use robots to inspect stay cables—without the need for bridge closures.
Once smart tendons or smart cables are installed, we can monitor the condition of these systems and of the surrounding structural elements. This monitoring is coupled with an in-built 24/7 alert and escalating alarm system for increased safety.
Capturing qualitative and quantitative data allows our engineers to interpret a bridge's data, assess any structural weaknesses with accuracy—and formulate corrective strategies in time.
Smart systems can predict external incidents like heavy storms that can affect a bridge's structural safety—and detect structural problems before they become serious.
Maintenance
We can rehabilitate, repair, and strengthen your structure for capacity upgrades, changes in use, changes in design codes, construction defects, ongoing protection, and deterioration damage.
Prevention maintenance stops damage and degradation—measures include protective cleaning, robotic wrapping systems, de-icing, and stay cable corrosion protection. Preservation maintenance rehabilitates a bridge to maintain its life. Our experience in repair and strengthening means that we identify potential risks before work begins.
We have experience in all types of rehabilitations, from the repair of grouting conditions and concrete to pylon and shear strengthening—as well as robotic PE welding systems and external prestressing.
Asset data pinpoints the root cause of structural problems for diagnosis and repair and informs confident budgeting decisions—making bridges safer, stronger, and smarter.
Frédéric Guitard,
Cable Stayed Bridge Area Manager, Signature on St. Lawrence Construction JV
Despite the unique construction challenges we faced, DYWIDAG addressed them all on time— in very practical, well-thought-out, and easy-to-implement ways.
Cast-in-place bridges offer flexible structural and architectural design
The majority of concrete bridges are cast-in-place bridges—constructed if the length of the bridge being built prevents the use of pre-cast elements and to protect the natural habitat around the bridge site.
Offering high flexibility in terms of structural and architectural design, cast-in-place bridges can be erected using different methods, from free-cantilever or incremental-launching to simple framework or scaffolding systems for single or multi-span girders or decks.
Pre-cast girder bridge construction reduces road disruption
Pre-cast bridges create minimal road disruption as concrete girders are cast in a factory then transported to the bridge site.
The girders are lifted into place onto abutments, and each joint is post-tensioned and filled with concrete to create a complete bridge structure.
Landmark DYWIDAG cable-stayed-bridges can be found worldwide
DYWIDAG stay cable systems are available in a wide range of cable sizes and provide extraordinary fatigue resistance and component corrosion protection.
We design our stay cable systems to meet the increasing demands of designers, owners, and users and have achieved full compliance with the governing recommendations for stay cable systems published by fib, PTI, and Setra.
DYWIDAG designed and built the world’s first extradosed bridge
In 1994 we designed and built the world's first extradosed bridge, The Odawara Blueway Bridge in Japan, using DYWIDAG stay cables.
Today, we have integrated a range of new features into our extradosed bridges, including a wide range of saddles and tower connection systems—simplifying their design and execution and delivering increased reliability and flexibility for designers, owners, and users.
DYWIDAG stay cable technology is applied in arch bridge construction
DYWIDAG post-tensioning and stay cable technology can be applied in the construction of concrete, steel, or hybrid arch bridges.
For projects where the available arch space in the arch bridge hangers is too small to align ordinary fixed anchors, we use clevis anchorage.