Recycling harmful plastic waste to produce a fiber equivalent to carbon fiber reinforced polymer for reinforcement and rehabilitation of structural members

Abstract

Abstract The main idea of this research is to manufacture plastic fibers (PFs) by recycling harmful plastic waste after washing it with water and drying it, then cutting it into strips and immersing them in liquid nitrogen, using a rotating iron basin mixer containing iron balls that touch these strips, producing fibers that are woven later to be similar to carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP). This process is the first in the world, and the cost of manufacturing these fibers is very low compared to the cost of producing CFRP, as the cost of producing these fibers is 25 times less than the cost of producing CFRP. All the physical, chemical, and mechanical properties of the manufactured PFs were investigated and compared with the properties of CFRP. In this research, it was found that the manufactured PFs have properties similar to the properties of CFRP. The experimental work consists of casting five reinforced concrete beams with a cross-section of 125 mm × 200 mm and a length of 1,200 mm. They were divided into two groups, each group containing two beams, one of which was reinforced by CFRP, and the other was repaired by CFRP. The second group also contained two beams, one of which was reinforced by PF, and the other was repaired by PF, while the fifth beam was a control beam. From the experimental results, a significant increase in the ultimate load of the beams reinforced by PF or CFRP ranged between 45.45 and 51%, respectively. This is due to the role of manufactured PFs and CFRP in restricting the width of cracks in the bending zone of reinforced or repaired concrete beams. Also, there was a change in the type of failure when changing the type of fiber, where the failure was ductile and gradual in the beams reinforced or repaired with manufactured PFs, unlike what was in the beams reinforced or repaired by CFRP, where the failure was brittle and sudden.