Influence of Casting Direction on the Mechanical Properties of Cementitious Fiber Reinforced Composites

Abstract

This paper is focused on behavior of fiber reinforced cement composites (FRC) and ultrahigh-performance fiber reinforced cement composites (UHPFRC) in dependence on the direction of casting. Almost fifty prismatic samples of size of 400 x 100 x 100 mm were cast into horizontal and vertical moulds. Forty of them with most corresponding results were used in this paper – twenty for FRC and twenty for UHPFRC. In each mixture three samples of both series were cast in the common horizontal direction and the other three in the vertical way. It was found that specific fracture energy of horizontally cast prisms was approximately four and half times higher for both materials than the vertically cast ones. The peak loads of FRC were very similar for both ways of casting. On the other hand the UHPFRC behaved differently, the peak load of horizontally cast prisms was approximately three times higher than the vertically cast ones. It was demonstrated that these differences are caused by the way of casting and vibration.