Fatigue behavior of concrete beams prestressed with partially bonded CFRP bars subjected to cyclic loads

Abstract

The lack of ductility is the greatest concern in the applications of carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) materials, when used as pre-stressing reinforcements. To improve the ductility, a partially bonded FRP system which is intentionally unbonded in the middle part of the beam and bonded in both end parts of the beam has been developed and applied to prestressed concrete beams. While, many researchers investigated the instantaneous performance of partially bonded CFRP prestressed concrete beams, this study intended to evaluate the fatigue performance, the static load-carrying capacity after fatigue loading and ductility. Based on the fatigue loading tests followed by static loading tests, over-reinforced and web-confined partially bonded CFRP prestressed concrete beams exhibited satisfactory fatigue performance without cracks and stiffness degradation during fatigue loading. In addition, no degradation of load-carrying capacity was observed in static loading tests after the fatigue tests. The ductility index of concrete beams, prestressed with partially bonded CFRP bars, is combined with over-reinforcements and web-confinements, similar to that of beams prestressed with steel bars.