EP1987203B1

EP1987203B1 - Joint design

Info

Publication number: EP1987203B1
Application number: EP07715845A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Marinus Josephus Buijnsters; Dirk Andeweg
Original assignee: Mj Buijnsters Beheer Bv
Current assignee: Mj Buijnsters Beheer Bv
Priority date: 2006-02-24
Filing date: 2007-02-21
Publication date: 2011-01-12
Anticipated expiration: 2027-02-21
Also published as: ATE495305T1; WO2007097619A1; NL1031606C2; DE602007011898D1; EP1987203A1

Abstract

A joint structure (1) is described, comprising: a substantially C-shaped profile rail (10) with an upper surface (11), a lower surface (12), a rear face (13) and a front face (14), and with an accommodation groove (15) for accommodating an edge (21) of an expansion profile (20); an assembly of mutually substantially parallel attachment plates (40), which extend substantially perpendicularly to the profile rail (10) and are attached to the profile rail (10). According to the invention, the joint structure has at least one coupling strip (50) directed substantially parallel to the profile rail (10) and attached to the attachment plates (40) at a distance from the profile rail (10). Preferably, the upper edge (51) of the coupling strip (50) is aligned with the upper surface (11) of the profile rail (10) and with the upper edges (41) of the attachment plates (40), and preferably the structure is made of thermally zinced steel.

Description

The invention relates to a joint design as a transition between two road parts which must be able to move with respect to each other. Such transition is for instance present between a road part located on solid ground (land abutment) and a road part on a bridge or viaduct. Between these two road parts, a gap will be present, and this gap must be closed in a watertight manner. Therefore, a joint structure comprises an elastic profile (rubber or elastomer or the like), in the following also indicated as expansion profile, that is held in two mutually parallel profile rails. In a typical situation, those rails are directed perpendicularly to the travel direction of the road part, although it is also possible that those rails make a smaller angle with the travel direction.
DE-A-2136842 discloses a joint structure, comprising a profile rail adapted for accomodating an axpansion profilet. The joint structure further comprises an assembly of mutually parallel attachment plates that extend perpendicularly to the profile rail. The attachment plates are mutually connected by a coupling strip that is directed parallel to the profile rail at a distance therefrom. Said document thereby discloses all the technical features of the preamble of claim 1.
As regard the situation of application, a distinction is usually made between application during newly building and application as renovation, and usually the structures used differ in those cases. The present invention provides a joint structure which is useable both for renovation purposes and for newly building purposes . As already mentioned, the overall joint structure normally comprises to mutually parallel rails, each rail being anchored with respect to the corresponding road part. Thus, the overall joint structure comprises two profile rails with associated anchorings, as well as an elastic profile, which is also indicated as expansion profile. Thus, the present invention already comes to expression in the combination of a single profile rail and its anchoring, for which reason in the following the design will be discussed of a single rail.
In order to make possible the anchoring of rail, the rail is provided with attachment plates, each located substantially in a vertical plane, substantially perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the rail concerned. The plates are typically provided with holes for arranging reinforcement steel wire or reinforcement bars parallel to the rails. Attachment pins are connected to this reinforcement steel, also indicated as anchoring pins or anchors. Subsequently, the whole is cast in in mortar, wherein the upper surface of this mortar comes to lie flush with the upper surface of the rail profile concerned. Thus, adjacent to the rail profile, there is a stretch of mortar with a width of some tenth of centimetres.
The final top layer of the road, typically asphalt, is arranged at a height corresponding to the upper surface of the mortar.
Several problems are associated with such structure. A problem concerns the transition from asphalt to mortar. For a good watertight connection, a groove is sawn or cut in the asphalt next to the mortar, which groove is subsequently filled with bitumen. This bitumen filling is then only supported by a thinner layer of asphalt.
An important problem concerns the fact of track formation in the asphalt. After passing of time, asphalt has the tendency of flowing away under the influence of the load by the traffic, especially the heavy freight traffic, so that in each lane two tracks develop, lying lower than the original level of the asphalt. However, the joint structure does not have this tendency, so that the rail and the mortar remain lying higher then the tracks in the lane part. In such case, the front upper edge of the mortar, i.e. the upper edge of the mortar directed away from the rail and directed towards the asphalt, is loaded increasingly heavier by the fact that the car tires, particularly those of lorries, bump against this upper edge on approaching the joint structure. Eventually, the mortar will damage.
When one would not use such mortar, and would lay the asphalt up to the profile rail, then the asphalt would still lower and lead to track formation, but then the profile rails are the victim of the "collisions" with the car tires: then, the profile rails might bend, and the watertight connection of the expansion profile might get lost.
The said attachment plates directed perpendicularly to the profile rails may be located at a relatively large depth, so that at their upper side they are completely covered by the mortar, but in a specific embodiment the upper edges of the attachment plates are lying in the same plane as the upper surface of the profile rails. Then, this means therefore that those upper edges are flush with the original height of the road surface. In the case of track formation, these upper edges then come to lie above the local level of the road surface. This brings along the risk that the free edges of those upper edges damage car tires. In order to prevent this, those upper edges are provided with a facet edge at their free ends, but applying (grinding) a facet edge is an additional operation and is thereby a cost aspect.
The present invention aims to offer a solution to these problems .
An other important problem concerns the durability of the profile rails and the attachment plates. The profile rails and the attachment plates are made of steel and must be protected against weather influences. To this end, they are provided with a coating consisting of multiple layers, which is relatively costly. Further, this coating is loaded by the traffic at the upper surfaces, causing the coating to wear. Once the coating is worn away, the metal parts are exposed, and expensive maintenance is needed.
An associated problem in that case is that the mortar does not adhere well to the coating. In order to obtain a good adhesion between the metal parts and the mortar anyway, the coating is only applied to the upper surfaces and to the upper parts of the side surfaces, i.e. over some centimetres from those upper surfaces. Below the coating, the mortar adheres well to the metal parts, but the mortar adheres badly to the coated upper parts of the side surfaces, so that seams occur between the metal parts and the mortar, so that water can enter and reach the non-coated metal parts.
Therefore, there is a desire to thermally apply a zinc coating on the entire metal structure, i.e. the profile rail and the transverse plates connected thereto. The durability of thermally zinced steel is much better than the durability of steel coated according to the state of the art. However, a problem here is that the profile rail becomes bent as a result of the heat treatment and becomes unusable. To date, it has not yet appeared possible to provide a thermally zinced joint structure .
The present invention also aims to offer a solution to these problems .
According to an important aspect of the present invention, the transverse plates are mutually connected by a coupling strip, running substantially parallel to the profile rail. This coupling strip is preferably located at a distance from the profile rail as large as possible, i.e. close to the free ends of transverse plates. Provided with such coupling strip, the profile rail will not or hardly bend when it is subjected to the heat treatment of a thermal zincing process. Thus, thanks to such coupling strip, it has become possible to thermally zinc a joint structure.
According to the invention, the coupling strip is connected to the transverse plates such that the upper surface of the coupling strip is located in the same plane as the upper surface of the profile rail and the transverse plates, in which case the coupling strip then joins the free ends of the upper edges of the transfers plates. Then, the coupling strip has a protection function because, in the case of track formation, car tires do not collide against the mortar and the head ends of the transverse plates, but against the coupling strip.
In a special preferred embodiment, the transverse plates extend beyond the coupling strip below the coupling strip. Then, it is possible, on applying the mortar, to arrange a form work against the head end edges of the transverse plates, and to pour mortar, in which case a mortar bed is created extending from the profile rail to beyond the coupling strip. This mortar bed operates as a foundation for the asphalt applied against the coupling strip in the final finishing. Then, this part of the asphalt will have much less tendency of track formation. Possible track formation in the asphalt decreases then in a more or less gradual manner in the asphalt itself, so that the traffic is less hindered by an abrupt lifting of the road surface. This increases the comfort for the road user and decreases the load of the joint structure.
These and other aspects, features and advantages of the present invention will be further clarified by the following description with reference to the drawings, in which same reference numerals indicate same or similar parts, and in which:

figure 1 schematically shows a perspective view of a part of a joint structure;
figure 2 schematically shows a cross section of the joint structure of figure 1;
figures 3A-E schematically illustrate a method for building a road;
figure 4 schematically shows a perspective view of a part of an other embodiment of a joint structure;
figure 5 schematically shows a cross section of the joint structure of figure 4;
figures 6A-E schematically illustrate a method for building a road with the joint structure of figure 4.

Figure 1 schematically illustrates a preferred embodiment of a joint structure 1. The joint structure comprises a steel profile rail 10 with a substantially C-shaped contour. The outer profile of the rail 10 is almost square with rounded corners, so that the rail 10 has a substantially horizontal upper surface 11, a lower surface 12, and two substantially vertical side surfaces 13 and 14 located opposite to each other. A central space 15 of the rail 10 is hollow and is accessible via an interruption in a side surface 14. This central space 15 forms an accommodation groove for a thickened edge part 21 of an elastomeric sealing profile 20. The dimensions are such that this thickened edge part 21 is held tight within the accommodation groove 15, wherein a watertight connection is achieved. The side surface 14 located at the side of the sealing profile 20 will hereinafter also be indicated as front face; the opposite side plane 13 will in the following also be indicated as rear face.
An entire joint structure comprises a second profile, identical to the profile rail 10 shown, wherein the two profile rails are arranged parallel to each other with their front faces directed towards each other, wherein the second profile rail holds the other side edge of the sealing profile 20. This sealing profile 20 is typically mirror-symmetrical with respect to a vertical plane 22. For the sake of simplicity, the second profile rail and the second halve of the sealing profile 20 are not shown in figure 2.
It is noted that such profile rails 10 are known per se. The outer dimensions are typically about 4 cm x 4 cm.
At the bottom side of the profile rail 10, a metal anchoring strip 30 extending substantially vertically downwards is connected in this embodiment. The longitudinal direction of the anchoring strip 30 corresponds to the longitudinal direction of the profile rail 10, i.e. perpendicular to the plane of drawing of figure 2, and the anchoring strip 30 extends over the full length of the profile rail 10. In this example, a rear face 31 of the anchoring strip 30 is substantially aligned with the rear face 13 of the profile rail 10. In a suitable exemplary embodiment, the anchoring strip 30 has a height of about 4 cm and a thickness of about 8 mm.
The joint structure I further comprises a system of metal attachment plates 40, of which only two are shown in figure 1. The different attachment plates are mutually substantially identical, and are mutually substantially parallel. Each attachment plate 40 is located in a substantially vertically directed plane perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the profile rail 10, and is attached to the rear faces 13 and 31 of the profile rail 10 and the anchoring strip 30. The mutual distance between subsequent attachment plates can for instance be in the order of about 20 cm. The attachment plate 40 has a horizontal upper edge 41 which in this preferred exemplary embodiment is aligned with the upper surface 11 of the profile rail 10. The attachment plate 40 extends substantially over the entire combined height of the profile rail 10 and the anchoring strip 30, so that the attachment plate 40 has a lower edge 42 substantially aligned with the lower edge 32 of the anchoring strip 30, although a difference of several millimetres is certainly allowable. In a suitable exemplary embodiment, each attachment plate 40 has a horizontal length of about 20 cm and a thickness of about 2 cm.
The vertical side edge of the attachment plate 40 which is attached, preferably by welding, to the profile rail 10 and the anchoring strip 30 will also be indicated as front edge 43. In order to assure a seamless contact between the front edge 43 of the attachment plate 40 and the rear face 13 of the profile rail 10, it has advantages if the rear face 31 of the anchoring strip 30 is shifted somewhat in the direction of the front face 14 of the profile rail 10/ a distance of several millimetres can easily be bridged by a welding seam.
The other vertical side edge of the attachment plate 40, which is thus at a distance from the profile rail 10, will also be indicated as free edge or rear edge 44. In the example shown, this rear edge 44 is a straight edge, but this rear edge 44 might also have a stepped shape.
Preferably, and as shown, each attachment plate 40 is provided with holes 45, through which reinforcement steel can be arranged.
It is noted that a joint structure as described so far, i.e. the combination of profile rail 10, anchoring strip 30, attachment plates 40, and sealing profile or expansion profile 20, is known per se in practice. It is further noted that in the application situation, i.e. the condition mounted in the road, two of such combinations are present in a mirror-symmetric arrangement, provided with a single expansion profile 20. In the context of the present invention, this whole will be indicated by the phrase "full joint structure", while the single combination of profile rail 10, anchoring strip 30, and attachment plates 40 will be indicated by the phrase "joint structure".
In the case of the joint structures known in practice, the attachment plates 40 are welded to the profile rail 10 and the anchor strip 30 exclusively at their front edges 43. The joint structure 1 according to the present invention distinguishes itself by a coupling strip 50 which is directed substantially parallel to the profile rail 10 and which is fixed to the attachment plates 40 at a distance from the profile rail 10. Preferably, the coupling strip 50 likewise is a metal strip welded to the attachment plates 40. This strip 50 has two important functions.
In the first place, the strip 50 increases the rigidness of the entire joint structure, causing it to be possible for the entire joint structure to be subjected to a treatment of thermally zincing without deformation of the structure. For achieving this effect of increased rigidness, the exact location of the coupling strip 50 is not critical. The coupling strip 50 might be fixed to the rear edge 44 of the attachment plate 40 at any height, or might for instance be fixed to the lower edge 42 thereof, preferably close to the rear edge 44. In such case, it is possible that a recess is arranged in the lower edge 42 or the rear edge 44 of the attachment plate 40 for mounting the coupling strip 50 entirely or partly in a recessed manner.
Figures 1 and 2 show the coupling strip 50 according to the invention, namely such that its upper surface 51 is substantially aligned with the upper edges 41 of the attachment plates 40. Caused by this, the coupling strip 50 obtains the important function of a protective strip which protects the structure against the shock loads of arriving car tires, and which protects arriving car tires against the influence of the ends 46 of the upper edges 41 of the attachment plates 40. It is noted that this protective function is also achieved in a structure that is not thermally zinced. However, the preferred embodiment is thermally zinced, and thus kills two birds with one stone.
For fulfilling both functions, the coupling strip 50 may extend over the full combined height of the profile rail 10 and the anchor strip 30, but this is not necessary. As will be explained later, it even offers advantages if the coupling strip 50 extends from the upper edges 41 of the attachment plates 40 only over a part of this full combined height. In a suitable exemplary embodiment, the coupling strip 50 has a height of about 4 cm and a thickness of about 2 cm.
Figures 3A-E schematically illustrate a method for building a road, making use of the joint structure I of figures 1 and 2. Figure 3A shows a roadbed 60 with an upper surface 62 and an end edge 61. A layer 63 of the road surface has already been arranged on this upper surface 62, but close to the edge 61 a stretch has been kept free. A joint structure I is placed on this free stretch close to the edge 61. Reinforcement bars, and anchors for anchoring the joint structure I to the roadbed 60, are not shown in these figures but can be usual reinforcement bars and anchors .
Figure 3B shows that mortar 64 is poured on the roadbed 60, in the space bordered on the one hand by the profile rail 10 and the anchor strip 30 and on the other hand by the layer 63. Alternatively, a separate form works could be used for the layer 63. The mortar 64 is poured to at least the height of the lower edge 52 of the coupling strip 50. It is important that, seen from the profile rail 10, the mortar 64 extends beyond the coupling strip 50, in order to form a mortar plateau 64a there.
Subsequently, one waits a little while to give the mortar 64 opportunity to harden somewhat. In this stage, a full hardening of the mortar 64 is not needed. The hardening achieved must be sufficient to achieve that in a next step, illustrated in figure 3C, a next layer of mortar 65 can be poured on to the first layer of mortar, in the substantially square spaces bordered by the profile rail 10, the coupling strip 50, and the attachment plates 40, without the mortar flowing below the coupling strip 50 and rising behind the coupling strip 50.
Subsequently, one allows both mortar layers 64 and 65, which then form a whole with each other, to harden sufficiently.
In a next step, illustrated in figure 3D, one applies a top layer 66 of the road surface, up to the coupling strip 50. This top layer typically is asphalt or the like. The upper side of the top layer 66 is kept flush to the upper surface 51 of the coupling strip 50.
For achieving a good watertight connection between the top layer 66 and the coupling strip 50, a groove is formed between the top layer 66 and the coupling strip 50, which is filled with bitumen 67 or another suitable material, such as also illustrated in figure 3D. Said groove can be formed by cutting or grinding away a part of the top layer 66, in which case it is advantageous that the coupling strip 50 can be used as a guide strip for the milling machine. As an alternative, it could also be possible to place a plank or the like against the coupling strip 50 on application of the top layer 66, which plank is to keep free the said groove.
An important aspect of the road structure thus achieved is that the bitumen filling 67 and the adjacent part of the top layer 66 are supported by the mortar plateau 64a.
Consequently, the end part concerned of the top layer 66 has much less tendency to track formation. Figure 3E illustrates that a possible track 68, visible in the figure as a lowering of the upper surface of the top layer 66, gradually becomes less deep at the location of the mortar plateau 64a.
Figure 4 shows a view comparable to figure 1, of a part of another embodiment of a joint structure 101 according to the present invention. In this other embodiment, the anchor strip 30 is moved to the front, i.e. in the direction of the front face 14 of the profile rail 10. Preferably, the front face 33 of the anchor strip 30 is substantially aligned with the front edge 17 of the lower surface 12 of the profile rail 10. This can also be seen in figure 5. A large advantage of this embodiment of the joint structure 101 is that the profile rail 10 is supported by mortar in the mounted condition, such as clearly follows from figures 6A-6E, which are figures comparable to figures 3A-3E, respectively, to illustrate building a road with the joint structure 101. The description given above in relation to figures 3A-3E applies here, too, and does not have to be repeated. The important point of difference is that the mortar 64, which on pouring extends to the anchor strip 30, now is also poured under the profile rail 10 because of this. After hardening, the mortar 64 then offers a support for the profile rail 10, such as shown at 64b in figure 6E .
It will be clear to a person skilled in the art that the invention is not limited to the exemplary embodiments discussed in the above, but that several variations and modifications are possible within the protective scope of the invention as defined in the attached claims. Particularly, other sizes can be used for the different parts. Further it is possible that there are multiple coupling strips present.

Claims

Joint structure (1; 101), comprising: a substantially C-shaped profile rail (10) with, in use, an upper surface (11), a lower surface (12), a rear face (13) and a front face (14), and a central space (15) forming an accommodation groove (15) for accommodating an edge (21) of an expansion profile (20); an assembly of mutually substantially parallel attachment plates (40), which extend substantially perpendicularly to the longitudinal direction of the profile rail (10) and are attached to the rear face (13) of the profile rail (10); at least one coupling strip (50) directed substantially parallel to the profile rail (10) and attached to the attachment plates (40) at a distance from the profile rail (10), wherein an upper edge (41) of an attachment plate (40) is substantially aligned with the upper surface (11) of the profile rail (10), characterised in that an upper surface (51) of the coupling strip (50) is substantially aligned with the upper edge (41) of the attachment plate (40)
Joint structure (1; 101) according to claim 1, wherein the height of the coupling strip (50) is smaller than the height of an attachment plate (40), such that the attachment plate (40) extends beyond the coupling strip (50) below the coupling strip (50), and wherein the attachment plate (40) is provided with holes (45) adapted for arranging reinforcement steel wire or reinforcement bars parallel to the profile rail (10).
Joint structure according to any of the previous claims, further comprising an anchor strip (30) directed substantially parallel to the profile rail (10) and directed substantially vertically downwards from the lower surface (12) of the profile rail (10) .
Joint structure according to claim 34, wherein the anchor strip (30) has a rear face (31) which is substantially aligned with the rear face (13) of the profile rail (10) .
Joint structure according to claim 3, wherein the anchor strip (30) is provided in the direction of the front face (14) of the profile rail (10), such that the profile rail (10) is supported by mortar in the mounted condition .
Joint structure according to claim 3, wherein the anchor strip (30) has a front face (33) which is substantially aligned with the front edge (17) of the lower surface (12) of the profile rail (10) .
Joint structure according to any of claims 3-6 wherein an attachment plate (40) has a front edge (43) which is attached to the rear face (13) of the profile rail (10) and to the rear face (31) of the anchor strip (30) .
Joint structure according to any of claims 3-6, wherein an attachment plate (40) extends substantially over the full combined height of profile rail (10) and anchor strip (30) .
Joint structure according to any of the previous claims, made of thermally zinced steel.
Road, comprising two road parts which must be able to move with respect to each other, wherein between those road parts a joint is present which is bridged by an expansion profile (20) of which side edges (21) are accommodated in a watertight manner in accommodation grooves (15) of profile rails (10) of respective joint structures (1; 101) of the said road parts wherein at least one of those joint structures (1; 101) is implemented in accordance with any of the previous claims.
Method for manufacturing an edge finishing of a road part which must be able to move with respect to an adjacent road part, the method comprising the steps of:
preparing a roadbed (60) with an edge (61); placing a joint structure (1; 101) according to claim 1 and 2, and preferably according to claim 9, on to the roadbed (60) with a coupling strip (50) at the side of the structure directed away from the edge (61);

arranging on to the roadbed (60) a limitation (63) for mortar, at a location which, seen from the edge (61), is located beyond the coupling strip (50) ; applying a first layer of mortar (64) in the space which is bordered by said limitation (63) on the one hand and

by the profile rail (10) on the other hand, up to a height which is a little higher than the lower edge (52) of the coupling strip (50); allowing the mortar (64) to harden somewhat; applying on to the first layer of mortar (64) a second layer of mortar (65) in the spaces which are bordered by the profile rail (10), the coupling strip (50), and the attachment plates (40); and applying a top layer (66) of the road surface, wherein this top layer extends at least to above a mortar plateau (64a) which is formed by that part of the first layer of mortar (64) which, seen form the edge (61) is located beyond the coupling strip (50) .
Method according to claim 11, further comprising the step of applying a watertight sealing between the top layer (66) and the coupling strip (50) .
Method according to claim 12, wherein a part of the top layer (66) adjacent to the coupling strip (50) is removed, preferably by milling, wherein the coupling strip (50) is utilised as guide, and wherein the groove thus formed is filled with an elastic mass which connects well to the top layer (66) and to the coupling strip (50), preferably bitumen.