Selection of Closure Pour Materials for CIP Connection of Precast Bridge Deck Systems

With the public's demands for reduced construction time and traveling delays, full-depth precast bridge decks or decked concrete girders should be more widely used and become a standard construction method for bridges. For the precast bridge deck system with CIP connection, precast elements are brought to the construction site ready to be set in place and quickly joined together, and a concrete closure pour completes the deck connection and ties the individual units together in a manner that is intended to emulate monolithic behavior. The selection of closure pour materials is critical. The performance criteria are being developed to select closure pour materials in this paper. The procedure and methods used in the NCHRP Project 10-71 for selecting durable bridge joint materials are discussed to demonstrate guidelines for selecting bridge joint materials. The performance criteria are determined, and two categories, overnight cure and 7-day cure, are developed for rapid construction. Candidate materials are collected accordingly. The short-term tests, including compressive strength and flow and workability, were performed to select closure pour materials and test results are discussed.