The effect of transverse steel rebars on the behavior of concrete beam reinforced with glass polymer rebars

Abstract

In the present study, the flexural behavior of concrete beams reinforced with longitudinal rebars made of glass fiber reinforced polymer composites (GFRP), is studied using finite element method. For this purpose, a number of concrete beams with square sections are modeled in ABAQUS. In all of the beams, four GFRP rebars with diameter of 12 mm, and 10 steel rebars with diameter of 8 mm are vertically used to prevent creating shear cracks in the beams. The beam no. 1 is without transverse rebar, beam no. 2 has a row of transverse rebar, which is placed at the bottom and in the plane of vertical rebars. Beam no. 3 has a row of transverse rebars that is placed at the top and in the plane of vertical rebars; and the beam no. 4 has two rows of transverse rebar at the top and bottom of the beam in the plane of vertical rebars. The beams are gradually loaded under up to 6 ton, and the amounts of displacement and strain at the middle of beams are compared together. The obtained results reveal that the forcedisplacement diagram of reinforced beams with composite rebars are almost linear until ultimate phase, and in all of the beams, adding transverse rebar leads to less deflection in the middle of the beam under an identical loading. Moreover, the load bearing capacity of beams containing transverse rebars, were higher than the other beams.