Bridge inspection and interferometry

by Krajewski, Joseph E.

With the majority of bridges in the country aging, over capacity and costly to rehabilitate or replace, it is essential that engineers refine their inspection and evaluation techniques. Over the past 130 years the information gathering techniques and methods used by engineers to inspect bridges have changed little. All of the available methods rely on one technique, visual inspection. In addition, over the past 40 years individual bridge inspectors have gone from being information gathers to being solely responsible for the condition rating of bridges they inspect. The reliance on the visual abilities of a single individual to determine the health of a particular bridge has led to inconsistent and sometimes erroneous results. In an effort to provide bridge inspectors and engineers with more reliable inspection and evaluation techniques, this thesis will detail the case for development of a new inspection tool, and the assembly and use of one new tool called Fringe Interferometry. i