Experimental Research on the Flexural Performance of RC Rectangular Beams Strengthened by Reverse-Arch Method

Abstract

Carbon fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP) reinforcement technology has been widely used in the reinforcement of reinforced concrete (RC) beams. At this stage, high prestressed CFRP board reinforcement is often used in actual reinforcement. However, most reinforced bridges are designed for a long time, and the design value of the protective layer is low, and it is impossible to achieve a large prestressed tension. Therefore, this paper proposes the reverse-arch method to paste the CFRP board and apply low prestress to strengthen the symmetrical RC beam. Through the three-point forward loading test, the cracking load, ultimate load, crack width, mid-span deflection, strain and failure mode of a reverse-arch method-pasted CFRP board-reinforced beam, a directly pasted CFRP board-reinforced beam and an unreinforced beam are compared. The results show that the load-bearing capacity and stiffness of the test beam can be improved by pasting CFRP plates with anti-arch method, but the ductility of the test beam is reduced. Compared with the unreinforced beam, the maximum cracking load and ultimate load are increased by 56% and 63% respectively. The reverse-arch method can produce low prestress, improve the stiffness and bearing capacity of members, and has a good prospect of engineering application.