Experimental study on behavior of steel channel strengthened with CFRP

Abstract

This paper describes the behaviour of axially loaded long and eccentrically loaded short thin-walled steel channels, strengthened with transversely bonded carbon fibre reinforced polymer (CFRP) sheets. Seven long members, each 1400 mm long, and seven short members, each 750mmlong, were tested. The main parameters were the number of CFRP plies (one or two) and the clear spacing between the CFRP strips (50, 100 or 150 mm). The effect of CFRP sheet layer and clear spacing was studied. All the ultimate load capacity of the reinforced members was improved in different extent. A maximum strength gain of 9.13% was achieved for long members with two CFRP layers and 50 mm spacing of CFRP strips. The experimental results show that the global buckling happens to all the long specimens. For short members, the maximum strength gain of 12.1% was achieved with two CFRP layers and 50 mm spacing of CFRP strips. With the exception of the most heavily reinforced (2 plies at 50 and 100 mm), local buckling was observed prior to global buckling for short members, which was completely opposite of the control specimens. Meanwhile, when the clear spacing of CFRP strips is greater than theweb height of steel channel, the transversely bonded CFRP does not have a significant improvement in buckling load capacity of the short- and long-channel components. While the clear spacing is less than the web height, the more number of CFRP layer, the more enhancement of buckling load capacity.

Keywords

• retrofit
• steel
• thin-walled
• channel
• cfrp
• buckling