Taming the monster

BBR HiAm CONA 127 06 – Successful fatigue testing

The BBR VT team has successfully completed a fatigue test, according to SETRA specifications, on a monstrous BBR HiAm CONA 127 06 strand stay cable. A BBR HiAm CONA 127 06 has an astronomic breaking load of 35,433,000 N. The extremely high forces – pushing the testing facilities to their ultimate limit – demanded that the test should be executed at very low frequency, resulting in over 650 hours testing time. SETRA specifications impose an axial stress-range of 200 MPa for 2,000,000 load cycles with anchorage rotations of ±0.6 ° under dynamic conditions. The BBR HiAm CONA system is also approved according to fib Bulletin 30 - including axial fatigue with anchorage rotation and leak tightness tests.