ABSTRACT
Strengthening and/or repairing of reinforced concrete structural elements has been a very trending research topic in the past few years. With the various proposition and invention of new strengthening and rehabilitation techniques as well as development of innovative materials, still there is wide need for investigating and experimenting those technique to improve their effectiveness and ensure integrity for the suitable strengthening selected. This was achieved by predicting and analyzing the possible defects through the results observed experimentally to fully understand their behavior. Thus, in this paper, two strengthening technique were selected for comparison out of 8 fully scale reinforced concrete beam elements. The two strengthening systems selected for comparison, here in this paper, are gluing 4 mm steel plates and double layer fiber reinforced cementitious matrix (FRCM). These beams were, also, compared against the un-strengthened one to encounter the increase in flexural capacity attended when using these beams. The results were discussed in terms of Load-deflection curve, load–strain curve and crack patterns. From the results, it revealed that Steel plates strengthening techniques is better than that of FRCM in several terms such as time, stiffness and strength. However, the FRCM strengthening techniques might considered to be less thickness than those provided by steel plates.
