Behaviour of FRP-to-concrete bonded joints

Abstract

The bond behaviour between FRP (fibre-reinforced polymer) and concrete is a consideration in the design of FRP strengthening mechanisms for structurally deficient or functionally obsolete concrete structures. In the past, a number of empirical models and fracture mechanics based theoretical models have been proposed for determining the effective bond length and bond strength of FRP sheets/plates bonded to concrete. However, these methods have yielded large discrepancies in the predictions of effective bond length and bond strength. In this paper, the results of an experimental investigation into effective bond length and bond strength are presented. Comparison of experiments results with predictions from three empirical and three fracture mechanics based theoretical models shows that a recently proposed fracture mechanics based local-bond slip model provides a conservative prediction of the effective bond length and an accurate prediction of bond strength