The Relationship between Compressive Strength and Splitting Tensile Strength of high-Performance Fiber-Reinforced Cementitious Composites

Abstract

The HPFRCC is defined by a stress-strain response in tension, which demonstrates multiple cracking and strain-hardening behavior. This experimental study aims to investigate the splitting tensile strength (STS), compressive strength (CS), and bulk density (BD) of HPFRCC. The CS of concrete should provide an accurate basis for the STS prediction. This study consists of two phases; in the first phase, 18 HPFRCC mix proportions with 1% steel fibers (30 mm length) were formulated by taking into account the various types of aggregate distribution, water-to-cement (w/c) ratio, amount of superplasticizer, and silica fume. After testing 108 cylinder and cube specimens at 7 and 28 days, a mathematical exponential function between STS and CS was proposed with a prediction error of less than ±15%. In the second phase, in order to evaluate the effect of steel fiber volume fraction and age on the prediction equation, three distinct volume fractions of steel fibers were considered: 0%, 1%, and 2%. At the ages of 7, 28, 56, and 90 days, 144 cube and cylinder specimens were tasted. The proposed equation for HPFRCC with 1% steel fiber can be applied to specimens containing 2% fiber with an error of ±20%. Adding fibers to the cementitious mortar had a small effect on the CS. However, at 28 days, the STS for HPFRCC with 1% and 2% fibers increased by 54% and 95%, respectively, compared to specimens without fibers.

Keywords

• high-performance fiber-reinforced cement composite
• hpfrcc
• compressive strength
• splitting tensile strength
• non-linear regression (nlr)