ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT: Many of the existing structures built according to obsolete codes may not have sufficient ability to resist major earthquakes expected in their areas. A major deficiency of these structures has been the inadequate amount of confinement reinforcement in the plastic hinge regions of the columns. To provide additional confinement to these deficient columns, fiber-reinforced polymers (FRP) jacketing provides an attractive solution. In this paper, a procedure for the design of confining FRP in square concrete columns is presented. The procedure is patterned on the philosophy of an available design approach for steel-confined columns and is based on the experimental results of FRP-confined columns. In this procedure, the required amount of confining FRP is a function of the column ductility performance and the level of axial load. The required FRP content increases with an increase in ductility increment demand and an increase in the level of axial load applied.
