Bridge coating inspections for Tararua district council: lessons learned

摘要

The Tararua District Council commissioned the author to carry out an independent condition assessment of the protective coatings on their 159 steel bridges and to make recommendations regarding their future maintenance. This paper discusses the lessons to be learnt with regard to the observed performance of different coating systems applied by unsupervised contractors. The systems used have included chlorinated rubber, epoxy-mastics, and a proprietary wax coating, with many systems suffering premature failure while others are providing protection well beyond their scheduled 12 year maintenance cycle.