The Ruhr Valley Bridge, Mintard, carries the A52 Essen-Düsseldorf autobahn across the Ruhr Valley close by the town of Mintard.

The Ruhr Valley Bridge is 1800 meters long, 27.5 meters wide and in the plan view it is curved in a 3000 meter radius.

The bridge was built in 1963-1966. The steel superstructure is designed as a continuous girder and the roadway deck is an orthotropic plate construction.
The roadway transition joints installed at the abutments are roller shutters made by DEMAG with a permissible displacement of + 700 mm.

After being in service for about 35 years, various renovation works were necessary. The following works were carried out:

1. The roller shutter structures were completely renovated at both abutments. This involved totally dismantling, cleaning and blasting the plate sets at our factory. After taking stock of the damage, all of the hinge linkages were restored and wear parts were replaced. In parallel with this, the substructural components on site were cleaned, blasted and newly corrosion proofed.

To assure safety and disturb traffic movement as little as possible, substitute plates (of the finger type) were laid into the recesses.

2. At the Düsseldorf abutment the cantilever structures in both traffic directions were destroyed by corrosion over a length of about 1.5 meters. The corroded cantilevers were cut off and replaced by new structures manufactured at our facility.

3. On the drag plate at the Düsseldorf abutment the old, leaky transition joints were replaced by new watertight joints manufactured by us.

4. In some places the bridge drainage system was unsound. New pipe couplings and seals were fitted to restore the drainage system to a watertight condition.