Health Assessment and Reinforcement Design of a Steel Horse-Riding Statue Structure

The bronze horse statue in Quanzhou Zhengchenggong Park was officially completed and opened to the public in 2004 and has been in existence for over 20 years. Due to the lack of regular inspection and maintenance of the statue's structure during long-term use， there have been multiple instances of damage and water leaks on the surface of the bronze statue， resulting in severe corrosion of the main steel structure and the secondary support system behind the copper plate. Therefore， a comprehensive inspection of the statue's interior is required. The structure was inspected using instruments such as ultrasonic thickness gauges and vernier calipers. The wall thickness of the steel pipe was reduced by about 2 mm due to corrosion， and the measured wall thickness of the ball joint was an average of 1-2 mm less than the original design wall thickness. The damaged thickness of the steel plate was 1 mm. Based on the construction drawings and actual measurement results， an overall structural evaluation model was established. The calculation results showed that the stress of the steel plate on the horse's back far exceeded the design value for steels， and the stress ratio of most members in the body and cloak was much greater than 1.0. The displacement ratio under the X-direction wind load was much greater than 1/150， indicating that the strength and stiffness of the main structure had exceeded the limit. A joint finite element analysis model was established in ABAQUS using the measured thickness， and the results showed that the stress in the body joint and the left hind leg joint had exceeded the strength design value for steels. Two semi-circular section reinforcement members were used to reinforce the original corroded steel pipe. The finite element simulation results showed that the reinforcement members and the circular steel pipe could work together to improve the compressive and bending bearing performance of the component. The steel plate was reinforced by welded plates， and finite element analysis confirmed that the stress distribution of the reinforced plate was generally consistent with that of the original steel plate； thus， the plate coukd work together with the original steel plate. Circular stiffeners were added between adjacent members and ball joints， and finite element analysis proved that the stiffeners effectively participate in load transfer， thereby reinforcing and strengthening the joints. Based on the reinforcement measures taken， establish a reinforced overall analysis model in MIDAS/Gen， and then apply the load combination conditions from the current specifications to complete the overall structural reinforcement analysis. The results indicated that the overall structural strength and stiffness indicators after implementing reinforcement measures met the requirements of the current relevant specifications. A numerical wind tunnel model was established using RWIND to obtain the wind pressure distribution of the structure under wind loads in the X and Y directions. The wind pressure was then applied to the structural analysis model for wind stability analysis. The results showed that the critical load coefficients in the X and Y directions were 10.7 and 25.9， respectively， both significantly higher than the limit of 4.2 in the Technical Specification for Space Frame Structures（JGJ 7‒2010） .