Mechanical and structural properties of polyvinyl alcohol fibre reinforced concrete (PVA-FRC)

University of Technology, Sydney. Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology.Concrete is a brittle material that has low tensile strength and low strain capacity. In fact, many deteriorations and failures in the concrete structures are due to the brittle nature of this material (Hamoush et al. 2010). These disadvantages may be avoided by adding short discontinuous fibres to plain concrete which has been a major motivation for many research works in recent years (Wu & Sun 2003). Fibres are added into a brittle-matrix composite to help improve three major aspects; toughness, ductility and strength (tensile) (Arisoy 2002). Fibres tend to increase toughness of the composite material by bridging the cracks and provide energy absorption mechanism related to de-bonding and fibre pull-out. Furthermore, they can increase the ductility of the composite by allowing multiple cracking. They may also help increase the strength by transferring load and stresses across the cracks. Advancement of fibre reinforced concretes (FRCs) started in the 1970s. By that time, only glass fibre and steel fibre were investigated (Perumalsamy & Surendra 1992). Synthetic fibres have become more attractive in recent years as reinforcements for cementitious materials. This is due to the fact that they can provide inexpensive reinforcement for concrete and if the fibres are further optimized, greater improvements can be gained without increasing the reinforcement costs (Li et al. 1991; Wang et al. 1989). Moreover, unlike the steel fibre which is highly corrosive in nature, there is no corrosion concern regarding synthetic fibres in concrete. During the past 20 years (since early 1990s), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) fibre has been introduced in the production of cementitious composites (Li 1998; Redon et al. 2001; Shen et al. 2008; Sun & Wu 2008). PVA fibres act greatly in a cement based matrix with no coarse aggregates due to their surface formation and high strength (Li et al. 2001). The resulting composite, which exhibits a pseudo ductile behaviour, is called engineered cementitious composites (ECC). Although many research works have been performed to date on the properties of PVA fibre reinforced ECC, there has not been much investigation on the mechanical and structural characteristics of PVA fibre reinforced concrete. Accordingly, the objective of this study is to experimentally observe the effects of adding PVA fibres to the conventional concrete to assess its mechanical and structural properties. To achieve this aim, a comprehensive set of experiments were carried out to investigate the effect of PVA micro fibre addition on mechanical and structural properties of conventional concrete. Therefore, concrete mixes containing PVA fibres of varying lengths (6 and 12 mm) in different fibre volume fractions ranging from 0.125% - 1% were prepared and tested for their fresh and hardened properties. The optimum fibre contents in terms of FRC performance were then selected to cast several concrete beams. These beams have later been tested for 4-point monotonic and 3-point cyclic flexure, to assess their structural properties. Hammer test was also conducted to evaluate the dynamic characteristics of conventional and FRC specimens as well as concrete beams

Static mechanical properties of polyvinyl alcohol fibre reinforced concrete (PVA-FRC)

This investigation assessed the performance of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) fibres of 6 mm and 12 mm length in concrete. Based on total concrete volume, four fibre fractions (0.125, 0.25, 0.375 and 0.5%) were evaluated for their effect on fresh and hardened properties of PVA fibre reinforced concretes (PVA-FRCs). Fly ash was also used as partial replacement of Portland cement in all the mixes. By carrying out a comprehensive set of experiments (compressive strength, splitting tensile strength, modulus of elasticity, modulus of rupture and residual flexural strength), it was observed that PVA fibre significantly enhances the static mechanical properties of concrete as well as improving its post-peak response and ductile behaviour

Flexural toughness and ductility characteristics of polyvinyl-alcohol fibre reinforced concrete (PVA-FRC)

This paper presents the results of an experimental study investigating the effect of un-coated polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) fibres on the properties of hardened concrete. PVA fibre of varying lengths, 6 and 12 mm and aspect ratio (l/d) of 430 and 860, respectively, was utilised in different volume fractions of 0.125%, 0.25%, and 0.5%. In addition, 30% fly ash was also used as partial replacement of Portland cement in all fibre reinforced concrete (FRC) mixes. Uniaxial compression, splitting tensile, modulus of rupture (MOR) and modulus of elasticity (MOE) tests were performed following the Australian Standards to evaluate the mechanical properties of PVA-FRCs. Fracture test is also conducted in accordance with European Standard in order to evaluate the residual flexural tensile strength and limit of proportionality of PVA-FRCs. Furthermore, the structural properties of reinforced concrete (RC) beams incorporating PVA fibres are investigated for their load-deflection behaviour using 4-point loading. Flexural toughness of the test specimens and peak load deflection were measured and discussed indicating to what extent the un-coated PVA fibre can enhance the brittle-like behaviour of concrete. Results show that adding PVA fibres to the mix generally improves the mechanical properties of concrete. Regarding the strength, the optimum fibre content goes to 0.25% for both fibre lengths and in the case of toughness and ultimate deflection 0.5% shows the highest values. An increase of 30% in ductility is noted for the RC beam incorporating 0.5% by volume fraction of 12 mm PVA fibre

FLEXURAL AND TENSILE CHARACTERISTICS OF POLYVINYL ALCOHOL FIBRE REINFORCED CONCRETE (PVA-FRC)

The Thirteenth East Asia-Pacific Conference on Structural Engineering and Construction (EASEC-13), September 11-13, 2013, Sapporo, Japan

INFLUENCE OF POLYVINYL ALCOHOL FIBRE ADDITION ON FRESH AND HARDENED PROPERTEIES OF CONCRET

The Thirteenth East Asia-Pacific Conference on Structural Engineering and Construction (EASEC-13), September 11-13, 2013, Sapporo, Japan

DAMPING PROPERTIES OF POLYVINYL ALCOHOL FIBRE REINFORCED CONCRETE

The Thirteenth East Asia-Pacific Conference on Structural Engineering and Construction (EASEC-13), September 11-13, 2013, Sapporo, Japan

The effect of heat-curing on transport properties of low-calcium fly ash-based geopolymer concrete

The aim of this study is to evaluate the transport properties of class F fly ash-based geopolymer concrete cured at various conditions. Twelve different heat curing regimes including three temperatures of 60, 75 and 90 °C and four curing durations of 8, 12, 18 and 24 h, as well as ambient curing, were imposed to the specimens. The material properties such as compressive strength, elastic modulus, ultrasonic pulse velocity, absorption, volume of permeable voids, pore size distribution and resistivity were evaluated against the reference Portland cement (OPC) concrete. Experiments showed that proper curing conditions such as curing at 75 °C for 18-24 h yield a geopolymer concrete with low volume of permeable voids and low sorptivity coefficient. The reduced volume of permeable voids and less continuous capillaries, attained by applying the proper curing regime, leads to an increased electrical resistivity and compressive strength of the low-calcium fly ash-based GPCs

Performance-based criteria to assess the suitability of geopolymer concrete in marine environments using modified ASTM C1202 and ASTM C1556 methods

© 2018, RILEM. In marine or coastal zones, the most harmful exposure for reinforced concrete structures to chloride ions. The ASTM C1556 chloride diffusion test (or its European equivalent NT BUILD 443) has been widely used as the most reliable testing method to assess the performance of concrete against chloride penetration. However, this test is time demanding and labour intensive. As a result, accelerated test ASTM C1202 (RCPT) is often preferred, providing fast and acceptable assessment of chloride penetrability of Ordinary Portland Cement Concrete. This study aimed to investigate the suitability of RCPT to assess the performance of Geopolymer Concrete (GPC) in chloride environment. The correlation between several GPC properties [i.e. compressive strength, volume of permeable voids (VPV) and sorptivity] and the chloride diffusion coefficient are examined. Results indicate that the compressive strength, the VPV and the sorptivity coefficient are not suitable indicators of the GPC performance. The ASTM C1202 standard RCPT failed to measure the charges passed through most of the GPCs tested. A modified version of RCPT using 10 V (as opposed to 60 V specified by standard ASTM C1202) is proposed in this paper, allowing to successfully measure the charges passed through all GPC samples using a wide range of binders. A good correlation was observed between modified ASTM C1202 and Standard ASTM C1556 test results. Performance-based recommendations are proposed in this paper. Both experimental results from this study and appropriate reference concretes from the literature were used to calibrate the modified ASTM C1202 and ASTM C1556 performance-based requirements for GPCs

Prediction of the steel-concrete bond strength from the compressive strength of Portland cement and geopolymer concretes

The oldest and simplest bond test, which is the standard concentric pull out test, is usually used as a comparative test for different concretes in order to assess the bond with deformed bars. In this paper, two types of concrete are considered: Ordinary Portland cement (OPC) concrete and a novel concrete technology, namely geopolymer concrete (GPC). Bond strength was investigated by conducting pull-out tests on ribbed bars with a nominal diameter of 10 mm and/or 12 mm. The specimens were tested at various ages ranging from 1 to 28 days. Compression tests were performed at all ages as well. The main objective of the extensive research program involving 260 pull-out tests was to develop empirical models correlating the steel-concrete bond strength to the mean compressive strength of concrete for both OPC and geopolymer concretes. The models developed are compared to the existing model adopted by FIP Committee