Abstract
Experimental and numerical studies have been carried out on reinforced concrete (RC) short tensile specimens. Double pull-out tests employed rectangular RC elements of a length determined not to yield any additional primary cracks. Tests were carried out with tensor strain gauges installed within a specially modified reinforcement bar and, alternatively, with fibre Bragg grating based optical sensors. The aim of this paper is to analyse the different experimental setups regarding obtaining more accurate and reliable reinforcement strain distribution data. Furthermore, reinforcement strain profiles obtained numerically using the stress transfer approach and the Model Code 2010 provided bond-slip model were compared against the experimental results. Accurate knowledge of the relation between the concrete and the embedded reinforcement is necessary and lacking to this day for less scattered and reliable prediction of cracking behaviour of RC elements. The presented experimental strain values enable future research on bond interaction. In addition, few double pull-out test results are published when compared to ordinary bond tests of single pull-out tests with embedded reinforcement. The authors summarize the comparison with observations on experimental setups and discuss the findings.
Highlights
The characteristics defining reinforced concrete (RC) are more intricate than for other structural materials, as this most common building material is highly nonlinear
The current study presents both the tensor strain gauge and the optical FBG strain gauge experiments in a combined investigation of reinforcement strain distribution within the RC elements
The tensor strain gauge experiments were used in a comparison
Summary
The characteristics defining reinforced concrete (RC) are more intricate than for other structural materials, as this most common building material is highly nonlinear This nonlinearity is clearly expressed in the various complicated relations between the material, geometrical properties when it comes to predicting the structural behaviour of RC and when serviceability analysis is in question. Besides the requirement for structures to carry design loads, the lifespan of the structure must be ensured through satisfaction of serviceability criteria. Among these criteria, the most imperative one for concrete is related to cracking, as it has direct influence on the appearance of the structure, and impacts the design capacity as well. Classical approaches [5,6,7] either consider perfect interaction or Sensors 2019, 19, 200; doi:10.3390/s19010200 www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors
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