Glass fibers Reinforced polymer bars have been prepared byvarious manufacturing technology and are widely used for various applications.Nowadays, it has been used in construction, aviation, electronics, andautomobile application etc. Glass fibers are having excellent properties likehigh strength, stiffness, flexibility, and resistance to chemical harm. Theyare in the form of roving’s, chopped strand, fabrics, yarns, and mats.
Each ofthose have unique properties and are used for various applications.In that case, Using Glass fiber reinforced polymer bars, analternative to steel as internal reinforcement for new concrete structures hasbecome a topic of interest due to the material’s high tensile strength, lightweight, and inability to corrode. Even the experimental testing is essential toobserve the actual behavior and failure mode of structures, this will be veryexpensive, more time consuming, and are non-destructive (not possible forexisting structures). Thus, the development and utilization of advancedanalytical methods such as finite element analysis (FEA) is being encouraged tostudy the behavior of structures.This research investigates the suitability of Glass fiberReinforced Polymer in Curved structures and its flexural behavior through a seriesof numerical models. Fibers Reinforced polymer (FRP) materials were originallydeveloped for the use in the aerospace and automotive industries due to theirhigh strength and light weight.
But later, because of some considerableshortcomings, it has been introduced in Civil engineering applications too. Steelreinforced concrete structures are susceptible to corrosion of thereinforcement in Alkaline medium and this induces tensile stresses within theconcrete which leads to deterioration of Concrete. So FRP reinforcing bars canbe proposed which does not corrode electrochemically and making this technologyis an attractive solution for structures in corrosive environments. Further, when it comes to curved structures steelreinforcements cannot be used at all situations because of its high Elastic ofmodulus. Thus, GFRP can be preferred for such situations which can show moreeffective performance in flexure.
Because of the shortcomings of the steel reinforcement, GFRPcan be used in various Civil engineering applications especially in curvedstructures. When a new material such as GFRP is introduced experimental testingis essential where the material is being utilized. As some results cannot bevisualized experimentally, preparing a numerical model will make more sensebecause it saves the time and cost. Due to the lower modulus of elasticity compared to the steel,larger deflections and crack widths can be expected. So a complete study on itsflexural behavior on curved structure should be carried out. This research tobe done to predict the curvature effects on flexural performance since it hasnot been researched widely. This research is mainly focusing on the curvature effects ofGFRP concrete beams and their flexural performance. All the predictions from this finite elementmodel will allow for an effective design of future experimental tests andaccurate prediction of beam specimen.
· Identify the appropriate material properties of GFRP usingexperimental study data· Simulate a numerical model to analyze the flexuralperformance of straight Glass fiber reinforced polymer bars used concretebeams.· Perform a numerical analysis of Curvature effects on flexuralperformance of Glass fiber reinforced concrete beams. After reviewing all existing research papers on the relevantresearch area thoroughly, current problems and other developed approaches canbe clearly identified. Hence, the appropriate modelling technique will bedefined. Then the material properties of concrete such as compressivestrength, tensile strength, modulus of elasticity, poison’s ratio will be obtained.Properties of GFRP should be also obtained from experimental studies. Numericalmodel of Straight GFRP Concrete beams should be simulated using ABAQUS.
Forthis, Beam parts and sections should be assigned, Concrete element should beselected and Beam boundary conditions should be assigned.Whilemodelling, discrete one dimensional truss sections and Smeared reinforcedmembrane sections both methods should be studied. Later, the model should bedeveloped to analyze the curvature effects on flexural performance of it. Finally the results obtained from experimentalstudy and numerical model should be compared and concluded.
