Uniaxial tensile behavior of engineering cementitious composite reinforced with fiber textile grid and steel wire mesh

Abstract

The Textile Reinforced Engineering Cementitious Composite (TRECC) is a cementitious composite material reinforced with short polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) or polyethylene (PE) fibers, possessing exceptional ductility. This unique attribute enhances the utilization of the textile grid’s strength and significantly improves the load-bearing and deformation capabilities of ECC members reinforced with textile grids. In this study, the effects of fiber textile grids and steel wire mesh on the tensile properties of ECC were investigated. The test results showed that the carbon textile grid significantly improved the peak strength of specimens. On the other hand, the glass textile grid significantly improved the ultimate strain of specimens. The carbon combined with glass textile grids can integrate effectively the advantages of both carbon and glass textile grids. When compared with single textile grids, the combination uses of steel wire mesh and fiber textile grids resulted in a significant improvement in ultimate strain and post-peak energy absorption values. Finally, based on the test data, this study proposed the peak strength calculation of TRECC and provided the stress–strain expressions of the initial non-linear strain hardening phase and the tensile softening phase and a related analytical model to describe the stress–strain behavior of TRECC.