Mechanical and durability properties of GFRP bars exposed to aggressive solution environments

Abstract

Two categories of GFRP specimens, in nominal diameters of 11.2 mm and 15.6 mm respectively, made of E-glass fibers and a vinylester resin were immersed in alkaline solution, saline solution and tap water solution at room temperature. The mechanical and durability properties of tested GFRP bar specimens were determined through direct tensile test and short-beam shear test after exposure to aggressive solutions for different days. The obtained results indicated that for all tested GFRP bar specimens the failure modes of fiber rupture in the tensile test and horizontal cracking in the short-beam shear test would not obviously change with the increasing of exposure period. However, the impact of immersion solutions on the durability degradation of mechanical properties of GFRP bars appeared in the ultimate strength and displacement at failure, and at room temperature the alkaline solution had a greater impact than another two solutions. Under the same exposure conditions, the resistance to the strength degradation of the GFRP bars with a larger diameter was better than that of the smaller GFRP bars. The comparison results indicated that the strength degradation trend of conditioned GFRP bars presented in our study was basically in agreement with the data given in previous studies.

Keywords

• gfrp bars
• aggressive environment
• mechanical and durability properties