Duration : 01.09.2011 – 31.08.2015
Supervisor : Professor Eugen Brühwiler
PhD student : Maléna Bastien Masse
Structural Behavior of One-Way and Two-Way R-UHPFRC – RC Composite Slabs
Adding a layer of 50 mm of Reinforced Ultra High Performance Fiber Reinforced Concrete (R-UHPFRC) is a promising method for improvement of reinforced concrete (RC) bridge decks. The layer of R-UPFRC protects the element against water and chlorides and strengthens it for higher traffic loads Noshiravani (2012) carried out cantilever tests on composite beams (150mm wide by 300 mm high) to study the behavior of members subjected to combined bending and shear. Two main failure type were identified :
- Ductile flexural failure along a vertical crack with no debonding between the layers;
- Brittle flexure-shear failure along a diagonal crack in the RC element which induces debonding between the layers.
Slab strips (400mm wide by 220mm high) without shear reinforcement are now tested in the same cantilever test setup. All the slab strips showed a flexural failure. The layer of R-UHPFRC delayed the apparition of the diagonal crack in the RC element of the composite section and prevented the shear failure.
Noshiravani (2012) developed a model to predict the behavior of composite members. The objective of this research project is to extend these models to two-way composite slabs.
