Investigating the load-deflection behaviour and drying shrinkage resistance of HPC reinforced using different cellulose fibres

Abstract

High-performance concrete (HPC) families exhibit superior compressive strength and excellent durability. However, HPC owing to its higher binder content and dense microstructure shows brittle failure under tensile loading and is susceptible to volumetric changes under drying shrinkage. The issues related to inferior ductility and lower shrinkage resistance of HPC were resolved by using different types of agro-fibres. This paper examined the influence of different agro-based fibres i.e., coconut fibre (CF), jute fibre (JF), and banana fibre (BF) on the flexural-tensile and drying shrinkage response of HPC. The behaviour of agro fibres was compared with that of synthetic polypropylene fibre (PPF). Investigated parameters include load-deflection response, compressive strength (CS), splitting-tensile strength (STS), drying shrinkage (DS) response, and rapid chloride ion permeability (RCIP) capacity. The results showed that in overall mechanical performance, JF and BF yielded better strength properties than CF and synthetic PPF. The addition of 0.3 vol% of JF and BF increased flexural strength (FS) by more than 20%. In terms of the flexural behaviour of HPC, both JF and BF owing to their superior tensile strengths showed higher efficacy than the synthetic PPF. Among agro-fibres, JF shows beneficial effects on the shrinkage resistance of HPC. BF and CF were useful in reducing the DS at 0.1% volume, however, the increase in the volume of these two fibres aggravated the shrinkage problem. As compared to PPF and other agro-fibres, JF yielded relatively better performance in terms of enhancing strength properties as well as shrinkage resistance of HPC.