Modeling and prediction of flexural strength of hybrid mesh and fiber reinforced cement-based composites using Artificial Neural Network (ANN)

Abstract

In this paper, Artificial Neural Network (ANN) has been used to predict the equivalent flexural strength of hybrid mesh and fiber reinforced cement-based composites (HMFRCBC). Three ANN models (Models 1, 2 and 3) were developed for predicting the flexural strength of cement-based composites. Model 1 used 48 data of the previously published data of the present authors and Model 2 used 48 data (out of the 75 ANN validated data) from previous studies related to mesh reinforced cement-based composites. Model 3 with 98 data (combined data sets of Model 1 and Model 2) employed seven input parameters, namely the width and depth of slab, cylinder compressive strength, mesh ultimate strength, mesh volume fraction, fiber volume fraction, fiber ultimate strength, and an output, the ultimate flexural strength of mesh and fiber reinforced cement based composites. Hidden layer was fixed based on 5 trial runs for Models 1 and 2, and 10 trial runs for Model 3. All the three models (Models 1, 2 and 3) were trained with 80% of the data, and tested with balance 20% of the data. For Models 1, 2 and 3, the Lowest Individual Error (LIE) of 11.18%, 6.95% and 11.56% (respectively) is achieved in Trial Run No.1.4 (with I-H-O, Input-Hidden Neurons-Output of 5-6-1), Trial Run No.2.2 (5-4-1) and Trial Run No.3.7 (7-10-1) respectively. Also, the lowest absolute average deviation (AAD%) of 4.81%, 3.51% and 4.58% (respectively); lowest Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) of 0.86, 0.76 and 0.99 (respectively); and highest R2 of 0.933, 0.988 and 0.975 (respectively) are seen for these trials 1.4, 2.2, 3.7 in Models 1, 2 and 3 respectively. All the three ANN models were found to be in good agreement with actual results, and these three ANN models can serve as simple but reliable predictive tools in determination of flexural strength of HMFRCBC.