A composite for the Future-Concrete Composite Reinforced with Shape Memory Alloy Fibres

Abstract

The advancements in infrastructure development has lead to the invent of many new construction materials and advanced construction practices in India. Due to urbanisation in many cities, the developing countries like India are now focussing on construction of tall buildings to compensate the land demand, for creating the infrastructure facilities. This trend has created a need for the concrete technologist to invent new materials which are high strength and which can cater to the needs of this development process. In this view many composite materials have been used in construction due to the several advantages offered by the materials, explicitly like reducing the dead weight of the structure, increasing the flexural toughness, increasing the load carrying capacity and reduction in cross sectional area of structural members. Self stressing steel fibre reinforced concrete is a composite material which can replace the conventional concrete as it has many advantages compared to the current materials that are used in today’s construction scenario. This paper discusses the properties of this composite material in terms of mechanical properties and also in terms of durability characteristics. Experimental results show that the compressive strength of this composite ranged from 25 to 43 MPa and the split tensile strength ranged from 2.6 to 3.8 MPa. The inclusion of shape memory alloy fibres has contributed to improved ductility and strain recovery of the composite. Experimental results have shown that this composite fibre with a hybrid fibre combination can be efficiently used to minimise the crack width upon heat treatment.