Strengthening of Concrete Beams Using Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymers

The use of fiber reinforced polymers, FRP, is one of the methods for strengthening and retrofitting concrete structures. In this research, the strengthening of reinforced self-compacting concrete beams against shear, torsion and bending has been investigated using GFRP. For reinforcing the beams against shear, bending and torsion, the strips of GFRP were used in the forms of U-shape, straight on the bottom surface and screwed around the beams respectively. In this study, the experimental results were compared with the results of the numerical models and their accuracies were confirmed. Then reinforcement sheets were applied in one and two layers on concrete beam models. By studying the numerical results obtained from Abaqus software, it was observed that with the increase of cracks in the concrete beams, their stiffness decreased and then the stresses were tolerated by the adhesive layers and the GFRP sheets, which has led to an increase in the bearing capacity of the beams. The results of numerical finite elements modeling show that by reinforcing the concrete beams with one layer of GFRP, the load bearing capacities of the beams improved in shear and torsion about 32% and 47% respectively. Moreover, if two layers of reinforcement sheets were used, the shear and torsion capacities of the beams increased about 45% and 61% respectively. The bending capacities of the concrete beams strengthened with one and two layers of GFRP increased up to 32% and 48% respectively