Evaluation on Dowel Force of Flexural Reinforcement with Shear Reinforcement Provided under Four Point Bending Load

The experimental investigation was carried out to study the influence of dowel force of longitudinal flexural reinforcement of concrete beams. Due to intricacy involved in shear transfer mechanism accurate predictions of shear behavior was difficult to evaluate. The influence of shear in uncracked compression zone, aggregate interlocking, stirrups is well understood but contribution of dowel force was not clearly represented despite implied belief that dowel force is an important constituent in shear resistance. The idea of present study is to appraise shear resistance arising from dowel force with varying flexural reinforcement with shear reinforcement provided. A total of eight beams were cast and verified as parametric study. Four beams were provided with preformed diagonal tension cracks and another four beams were conventional beams. The study was carried out by keeping shear span to depth ratio and clear cover constant. Results obtained was studied from moment vs. displacement curve and strain vs. moment curve and compared with existing empirical formulas. It was noticed that aggregate interlocking is insignificant with shear reinforcement provided and beams with preformed diagonal tension cracks had exhibited greater structural behavior when compared to conventional beams.