Stiffness and Strength Analysis of Flexural RC beams strengthened with CFRP Sheets Considering the Influence of Pre-cracking

Abstract

                           This paper presents experimental, numerical and analytical analysis of newly cast and pre-cracking flexural reinforced concrete beams strengthened with CFRP. In total, 9 intermediate-scale composite beams were cast and tested using 4-point bending test setup. Midspan deflection, width of the cracks, concrete and CFRP strains were measured during the experimental program. Clear efficiency of composite pre-cracked beams was observed in comparison to newly cast beams: enhanced flexural capacity and increased stiffness after appearance of primary cracks in tension zone. Good agreement was found comparing experimental and theoretical (EC2) deflections of RC beams strengthened with CFRP. However, for more detailed verification, the analysis should be extended with more specimens. The shear stress at the end of CFRP sheets between the concrete and CFRP increased rapidly until reaching maximum slip value, when the reinforced concrete beam strengthened with CFRP reaches 60-90 % utilization of load bearing capacity. All experimental results were compared with numerical and analytical calculations. Experimental, numerical and analytical results were in sufficiently good agreement.