Experimental analysis of time dependent phenomena and temperature effects on macro-synthetic fibre reinforced concretes in different loading conditions

Abstract

Fibre reinforced concretes (FRCs) are composite materials now largely adopted in structural applications given their mechanical properties in terms of the residual tensile strength, almost absent for plain concrete. The short-term mechanical behaviour of these material has been deeply studied, while their time-dependent deformations have received less attention from the scientific community. The present paper presents the experimental characterization of the creep deformations of a concrete reinforced with polypropylene fibers by means of different types of tests, together with an analysis of the temperature effect. Innovative test set-ups are used to this aim. The paper presents the results of shrinkage, compression creep, uniaxial tension and flexural creep tests and discusses the contribution of the different components of the FRC to the composite creep behavior.