Axial Tensile Strength Analysis of Naturally Treated Bamboo As Possible Replacement of Steel Reinforcement in the Concrete Beam

Abstract

This paper was undertaken to evaluate Giant bamboo (Dendrocalamus Asper) which is abundant natural resource that can be considered as an alternative for construction materials for reinforcement to compensate the low tensile property of the concrete. Considering the cost, even though steel reinforcement is a very suitable material for complementing concrete’s low tensile strength, bamboo products as it enter the diverse worldwide markets, the value of these natural resource stands to grow. Bamboo and steel are structural materials with different engineering qualities used for the construction of buildings and other engineering construction related purposes. To overcome these problems, full socio-economic potential of bamboo is yet to be realized as alternative materials to substitute the reinforcing bar in concrete for less important structures by investigating the tensile properties of this type of natural reinforcement. To evaluate these properties, 5 for each bamboo were tested in natural preservation submerged in fresh-water and salt-water for 7 days and 28 days cycles for internode and node section in which tension test was conducted on bamboo specimen following the ASTM standards. From this test, average ultimate tensile strength is approximately 211.18 MPa in the specimens without node for 7 days soaked in salt-water and 138.97 MPa in the specimens with node soaked in fresh water for 28 days. Finally, 7 cycles of wetting and drying in solution of salt-water treated did not increase the bamboo tensile strength neither the Young’s Modulus, therefore, the study concludes that due to the minimal breaking force (FB) of bamboo, it cannot be employed as a main structural member in buildings and other heavy engineering works but can be used for partition walls, ceilings, roofs and other areas of lightweight engineering construction that is not heavy loadbearing capacity.