Retrofiting of Reinforced Concrete Beams Using Fibre Reinforced Polymer
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Date
2016-04
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Infrastructure development is raising its pace. Many reinforced concrete and masonry buildings
are constructed annually around the globe. With this, there are large numbers of them which
deteriorate or become unsafe to use because of changes in use, changes in loading, change in
design configuration, inferior building material used or natural calamities. Concrete is a material
that can withstand compressive loads very well but is sensitive to tensile forces. Therefore,
concrete structures are typically reinforced by casting in steel bars in areas where tension can
arise. This cannot be done afterwards, and one strengthening method, is therefore to glue
reinforcement on the exterior of the structure in the areas exposed to tension. Fiber composite
can be used in reinforcing concrete structures externally. Fiber composite materials have low
density, can be easily installed and are easy to cut to length on site. Therefore, fiber composite as
external reinforcement for concrete structures has become very attractive and popular around the
world. Thus repairing and retrofitting structures for safe usage of these structures has a great
market. There are several situations in which a civil structure would require strengthening or
rehabilitation due to lack of strength, stiffness, ductility and durability. Beams, columns, plates
may be strengthened in flexure through the use of FRP bonded to their tension zone using epoxy
as a common adhesive. Due to several advantages of fiber wrapping over conventional
techniques used for structural repair and strengthening, the use of FRP has becoming popular.
This paper makes a comparative study between the load carrying capacity of an RC beam and
other beams with FRP bonded. An experiment study is carried out to study the change in the
structural behavior of RC beams externally bonded with FRP of different thickness to enhance
the flexural capacity of beams along with the existing practice of doing the repair work.
Experimental tests were performed to investigate the behavior of retrofitted beams. The model
was verified through comparison with the experimental data regarding failure mode and loaddisplacement
behavior.
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Structural Engineering