Experimental investigation on shear behaviours of textile reinforced concrete beams

An experimental study on eight concrete beams reinforced by combining GFRP bars for moment and glass textile sheets for shear resistances is conducted to examine the use of these non-corrosive reinforced materials in creating the structural concrete beams. Rectangular cross-section beams with two different aspect ratios, 1.1 and 1.7, are investigated. For each group, there are two control beams with and without GFRP bars for shear reinforcements. The other two beams in each group are reinforced with one and two glass textile grids for shear resistance. Fine-grained high-strength concrete with a similar grade is used for all tested beams. Three-point bending tests are employed to examine the shear performances of these specimens, including the load-deflection curves, cracking patterns, failure modes and strains in reinforcements. The experimental results indicate that the crushing failure is recorded in all tested short-span beams reinforced with shear reinforcements. Increasing the number of textile layers improves the shear capacities of the specimens. The shear strengths of the tested beams are significantly affected by the aspect ratio. Finally, the ratios of the effective experimental strength over the compressive strength of concrete are compared with the existing guidelines.