Enhancement of Flexural Strength of Reinforced Concrete Beam using CFRP

Abstract

Concrete structures deteriorate over time due to environmental degradation, fatigue and other reasons which make performance of these structures unsatisfactory. Strengthening and rehabilitating those concrete structures with fiber-reinforced polymers is advantageous solution among several other strengthening solutions. However, use of FRP composite materials in structural engineering involved specialize training or exposure to FRP composites as construction material. Recently these composites have been recognized by official building codes and have codeapproved design procedures for use in structural engineering which means these composite materials could be used without involving people who specialized expertise in the use of FRP composites. In our study, a simply supported cracked beam was strengthened with carbon fiber-reinforced polymer flexural strengthening system which was designed according to the American Concrete Institute publication ACI 440.2R-02. This code-based design helped to produce economic FRP flexural strengthening system which resulted in increase in ultimate load carrying capacity, reduction in midspan deflection and flexural cracks without any catastrophic failure