On the 14th of September 2022, the UPC team, led by the associate professor Rolando Chacon, published a paper entitled “Geometrical digital twinning of a tapered, horizontally curved composite box girder bridge”. This publication was presented at the International Colloquium on Stability and Ductility of Steel Structures 2022.
It presents the ASHVIN Demo Site #7 “Bridges in highway network in Spain”: A composite bridge located in the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona represents one of the sites for demonstrating the capabilities of digital twins on maintenance of built assets. Digital twins can be deemed a digital living replica of the physical one that provides real-time information through adequate connectivity (sensors, images, remote sensing) and automated visualization of the asset for decision-making purposes (performance indicators assessed regularly). This demonstrator is an 846 meters long composite bridge with plates and a concrete slab. The plates are tapered along a portion of its length. The bridge is horizontally curved with a bifurcation at its end. One of the challenges in this demonstrator is to reproduce realistically the “as-built” shape of the plates using a terrestrial laser scanner for simulation purposes. The outcome of this specific side of the digital twinning (other sides also include many sensor- and image-based methods) is of great interest to maintenance managers. Understanding the real configuration of the asset represents an accurate starting point for subsequent modelling.
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