LADV-11 DESIGN VEHICLE RESEARCH

LADV-11 was developed to alleviate the need for designers to check all eight of the Louisiana Special Design Vehicles (LSDV) for Strength II conditions with a specific load factor. This complicated process required large design efforts and often resulted in new bridges not meeting the minimum load rating design criteria. Research from the extensive parametric study conducted by SDR resulted in the development of variable magnification factors for moment, shear, and support reactions that could then be multiplied by the HL-93 design load in place of analyzing the 8 LSDV vehicles. These magnification factors were developed using an “Upper Boundary Approach Method” and resulted in substantial time and cost savings by allowing engineers to design for only one vehicle while ensuring that minimum load rating requirements are met.