Fibre reinforced polymer (FRP) structures have been increasingly applied in construction, including in road bridges due to their advantages of lightweight, high specific strength and corrosion resistance. However, the brittle nature of FRPs leads to the need for ductile joints to improve the safety of FRP structures. To that end, Glass FRP rebar-reinforced Polymer Concrete (GFRP-RPC) joints between cellular GFRP deck units, combined with an adequate external energy dissipation device (that functions as a replaceable fuse), may fulfil this need for such decks. This PhD study focuses on the load responses of GFRP-RPC joints between cellular GFRP deck units by full-scale anchorage and joint tests, along with simplified methods for predicting the failure loads of the joints. From these studies it is concluded that the GFRP-RPC joints failed by moment-induced rebar-to-polymer concrete anchorage failure. The joints were of high efficiency and shear-strength, and exhibited impressive recovery ability after unloading from large deflections after failure. Further, friction between the polymer concrete confined within the cells of the GFRP decking and the GFRP rebars can contribute to energy dissipation during load cycling. Using rebar-to-polymer concrete shear bond stresses deduced from anchorage testing, it is shown that anchorage failure can be monitored by the third of three phases of behaviour observed during testing. Simplified methods for predicting shear and bending moment capacities of GFRP-RPC joints generally showed good correspondence to experimental data. Future work can focus on cumulative residual shear bond stresses and irreversible slip observed in the anchorage tests, and also on shear failure behaviours of GFRP-RPC joints. Further, a half plastic hinge (HPH) joint (GFRP-RPC joint combined with an adequate external energy dissipation device) between FRP components has been under development by the author. It is expected that "a ductile FRP structure" can be achieved via these HPH joints.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:702461 |
| Date | January 2014 |
| Creators | Hsueh, Fu-Kan |
| Publisher | University of Bristol |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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