US Government As Represented by the Secretary of the Army

Richard W Helmke

David C Smith

Mark P Levine

A modular lightweight bridge comprises a pair of tubular truss formed spans, each of which include a plurality of modules hinged to one another at locations on the bottom of the bridge for folding the bridge for transport prior to deployment of the bridge. Each span has a unique high strength fabric deck or roadway surface tensioned across the upper side of the truss chord members. The bridge is uniquely captively mounted on a trailer by rollers for transporting the bridge when it is in its folded mode. When the bridge is to be deployed, each span is unfolded by pivoting the modules with respect to one another about vertical axes so that the spans expand longitudinally with respect to the trailer. The spans are then pivoted 90.degree. downwardly about longitudinally extending horizontal axes and the bridge rolled rearwardly from the trailer over the gap to be spanned. Due to the unique captive roller interconnection between the bridge assembly and its transport-deployment trailer, the trailer can thereafter be stored beneath the deployed bridge hanging down into the gully or gap. When a decision is made to remove the bridge, the trailer can be towed from either side back over the bank of the gap and the bridge refolded for mounting on and transport by the trailer.

Lightweight, collapsible bridge module, and system with deployment and

A folding tactical bridge module and bridging system and method of deploy and retrieval. Each module is made up of three longitudinally collapsible units interconnected and folded in a side-by-side arrangement to be carried by a bridge transporter vehicle. Each unit includes an arched roadway portion made up of two arcuate segments with a hinge at the centerline and a truss hingedly connected at each longitudinal edge. Tensile links tie the edges of the arched roadway together. The module folds in two ways with the tie links nested between the vertically collapsed first folded roadway segments which in turn are nested between a pair of vertical trusses. The three units of each module are in turn folded a second time into a side-by-side compact relation upon a transporter deploying vehicle. The bridge may be expanded and emplaced by the bridge transporter vehicle and its two-man crew using self-contained extendable-retractable interconnectable traversing beams associated with each of its three units.

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Stafford, VA, United States of America

Richard W Helmke