ABSTRACT
The use of glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) bars as main reinforcement in concrete structures is an attractive option for structures in aggressive environments. In comparison to steel, GFRP is light and strong but it is less stiff and has a linear elastic brittle behaviour. The behaviour of concrete members reinforced with GFRP bars is different than traditional steel reinforced concrete members. The presented research focuses on the finite element analyses (FEA) of concrete beams reinforced with GFRP longitudinal and shear reinforcements and on frame closing joints reinforced with GFRP. The use of calibrated FEA is important because it allows to extend the limited experimental database, to gain insights into mechanical behaviour of structural members and to guide in the development of rational design provisions. FEA of concrete members reinforced with linear elastic brittle reinforcements (like GFRP) presents different challenges than analysis of members reinforced with plastic (steel) reinforcements. The use of FEA was performed using the commercial software ABAQUS. A concrete damaged-plasticity (CDP) model was utilized to simulate the concrete behaviour. The influence of tension, compression, dilatancy, mesh, and reinforcement modelling was studied to replicate experimental test data. The issues related to proper calibration of input parameters, specifically for concrete reinforced with GFRP are discussed and recommendations for the FEA modelling are offered. Examples of parametric studies on GFRP reinforced concrete members are presented and discussed.
