Condition Assessment and Adaptation of Bailey Bridges as a Permanent Structures
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
1. There are plenty of language problems in this paper: 1) some words are not widely-used in academic aspects, e.g. “in-silico models” in the abstract; 2) some words are not the proper term, or difficult to understand, e.g. “transducer needle” and “bearing shoe” in Section 2.3.1; 3) some sentences are incorrect in grammar.
2. Figures are numbered incorrectly, starting from “Figure 2” in Section 3. The cross references in the text are also wrong, which makes a lot of difficulties in reading. In addition, the readability is worsen by the languages that are hard to understand in some captions, e.g. “ Figure 8. Plastic and Compact bounds”, “Figure 14. (a) Out-of-plane deformation of 1. (b) First Eigen Mode Value stresses”.
3. In Section 3, the deflection angles determined by different methods are so different. It seems that the maximum error can be about 200%. The reason should be explained. Similar problems can be observed in the deformation presented in Figure 3.
4. In Section 4, the analysis to determine the critical members, as well as the eigenmodes, should be illustrated in detail, e.g. the loading case, the analyzing procedure, etc. It is also confusing about the initial imperfection when reading “The value obtained for imperfection was 1.06E + 06 with deformation of 1 N” in Section 4.5.2.
5. How is the SLS and ULS determined by considering these limited loading cases? Load Case 1~3 are analyzed for only three types of vehicles. Apart from that, it should also include other types of live loads, e.g. the wind, the temperature, the foundation settlement, etc. Overall, by the analyses presented in this paper, there still lacks of a strong demonstration of using it as a permanent structure.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The abstract part is difficult to understand, it should be written again more clearly.
Figure 6-7 should be drawn more closely, in this case it is difficult to understand.
The results are very complex and difficult to understand, they should be written again in a comprehensible way.
Figure numbers are written incorrectly, should be checked.
Author Response
Please see the attached
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear authors,
Firstly, I would like to congratulate you on the very interesting paper with a comprehensive approach allowing you to see not the numerical solutions and results but also real-life measurements. However, some remarks need to be addressed before accepting the paper.
A) General remarks
1. Article is clearly written and easy to follow. The authors give relevant references which are linked to their study.
2. The abstract is well written introducing the basic overview of the paper. It is also written in a way that even a person not familiar with the topic can understand what the authors are proposing in their research.
3. The introduction provides basic background and overview of the Bailey Bridges research. However, the methods used by the authors and their state of the art are not presented. Additionally, the introduction is not presenting the state of the art for some measurement techniques used in the paper. The authors are using typical approaches to measurements (with little information about equipment look point 5). They use e.g. modal analysis or image processing. However, there are many novel techniques for many of these tasks like using 3D Laser Doppler Vibrometry (3D LDV)(for modal analysis) or Digital Image Correlation (DIC) for stress/strain/deformation measurements and many more that should be evaluated in the introduction or in the chapter on measuring itself. For 3D LDV examples are here modal analysis on steel blades "Quality Assurance and Control of Steel Blade Production Using Full Non-Contact Frequency Response Analysis and 3D Laser Doppler Scanning Vibrometry System" 2021 11th IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Data Acquisition and Advanced Computing Systems. In case of DIC G. Chen DIC-Based Operational Modal Analysis of Bridges, Advances in Civil Engineering, 2021 and M. Mousa, Application of Digital Image Correlation in Structural Health Monitoring of Bridge Infrastructures: A Review, Infrastructures, 2021.
4. In the case of the research design to assess if it is appropriate it is necessary to know what norms were used for testing not only the assumptions and choices made by the authors. Currently, it is not know why the authors chose some of the experimental elements.
5. The authors do not provide detailed information on the systems/software etc. used for the data acquisition as well as for the sensor used for those measurements. Moreover, the specification of data acquisition parameters and signal processing is also required for the possibility of future cross-checking of this research.
8. There are no significant remarks to the results which are clearly presented. However, some of the figures are suggested to be enlarged or to make the text more visible. Look at part B of the evaluation.
9. In the case of the conclusions the authors emphasise what was done in the paper. I would suggest reconsidering the way the conclusions are presented to emphasise the usefulness of the results and their application. If the authors decide to leave the conclusions as they are I would suggest adding a few sentences on this matter. Especially to strongly state the novelty of the research presented. In its current form, the novelty is described a little bit in the abstract but otherwise is not fully presented in the paper.
B) Item remarks
Fig 2. Most of the values are not visible. This was very nicely presented in Fig.1 but Fig.2 is problematic to read.
Fig.3 suggest enlarging the pictures maybe by placing all of them in one column and with only one in the row.
Fig.4 is very important for the reader but is difficult to observe everything. Most of the text is not visible (especially pictures A and B)
Fig. 9 and after please unify the style and especially details like legend size etc. Additionally, there is something wrong with numbering. There is Fig.9 and later 14, 10 and 11
C) Conclusions
The article is interesting and a lot was done in the case of measurements and data analysis. However, in its current form, there are some serious problems and missing information. Thus the reviewer asks for some major revisions and will be glad to read the paper again after the improvements.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors have answered all the questions in a proper way, and the readability of the paper is also improved. I do not have further questions.
Reviewer 2 Report
Corrections have been made in the criticisms written by other referees and myself, and it is appropriate to publish the article.
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear authors,
The paper looks much more professional now. Although, there are still some small elements to be improved and some editing corrections to be done the article has a sufficient quality for publication.
Best regards,
The reviewer
