Abstract:
Currently, Carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) is being used as alternative to
conventional steel reinforcement to minimize deterioration and maintenance costs of
damaged steel RC member. This is partly due to CFRP’s characteristics such as immunity
against corrosion, light unit weight, and high tensile strength. However there is gap in
literature about behavior CFRP rebar reinforced concrete members under fire loading.
This study presents comparative fire resistance behavior of conventional steel rebar and
CFRP rebar reinforced beam. An experimental test result reported in literature (Agrawal
and Kodur, 2019) was used for validation analysis using ANSYS nonlinear finite element
analysis (FEA) software program. Further, parametric study of 36 models on influential
variables such as concrete cover, fire exposure faces, fire durations and reinforcement
ratio were performed to get insight in to fire resistance behavior of CFRP and
conventional steel rebar reinforced beams.
Finite element analysis results indicated increasing concrete cover thickness from 0.025m
to 0.055m resulted in residual ultimate load carry capacity gain for both carbon fiber
reinforced polymer and steel reinforced concrete beams from 105.041KN to 167.081KN
and 78.69KN to 104.12KN, respectively whereas, strength loss due to fire ranges were
from 25.4 to 19% and 47.7 to 33%. Additionally, when reinforcement ratio was increased
from 0.92% to 1.54%, residual ultimate load carry capacity of both carbon fiber
reinforced polymer and steel reinforced concrete beams were increased with a range of
108.34KN to 152.82KN and 65.21KN to 116.71KN whereas, strength loss due to fire
ranges were from 45.7 to 37.5% and 31.1 to 16.6% respectively. As compared to concrete
cover and reinforcement ratio, fire exposure faces and fire durations had little effect and
steel reinforced beams exhibited ductile nature than carbon fiber reinforced polymer
reinforced concrete beam.
Keywords: - Fire, Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer (CFRP), Steel rebar, Beam, ANSYS