Materiales de Construccion (Jun 2013)
Influence of the number of keys on the shear strength of post-tensioned dry joints
Abstract
The shear strength of dry joints plays an important role in the design of prestressed segmental structures. However, the formulations of different design codes do not conform to the behavior of multiple-keyed joints. This paper ana - lyzes the fracture behavior of dry keyed joints under shear loading, focusing on the influence of the number of keys on the joint capacity and its average shear stress. It has been developed a finite element model of four different types of joints, with a number of keys varying between one and seven. The results show that the average shear stress transferred across the joint decreases with the number of keys but this effect is less appreciated as the prestressing stress increases. In this paper it is presented a formula of adjustment of the obtained numerical results including a factor with the dependence on the number of keys.
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