Prediction of shear capacity of concrete beams reinforced with FRP bars

Abstract

Currently, Fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) bars have gained the popupar acceptance as an alternative to conventional steel bars for concrete members due to their corrosion resistance, high strength against low weight, magnetic immunity. Therefore, predicting the strength capacity of such members, particularly the shear capacity is one of the most important issues in design. In this paper, the prediction method and assessment of the shear strength of concrete beams reinforced with FRP bars according to three codes ACI 440.1R-06, CSA S806-02 and JSCE-1997 is presented. The paper then proposes a simple formula to predict the shear strength for FRP bar-reinforced concrete beams. The predicted values are compared with 73 experimental results obtained from previously published researches. The results indicate that the design codes are relatively conservative with large coefficients of variation, while the proposed equation gives results that are in better agreement with the experimental results and a lower coefficient of variation.