Journal of Constructional Steel Research 71 (2012) 143–148

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Journal of Constructional Steel Research

Study on Recycled-Concrete-Filled Steel Tube and recycled concrete based on

damage mechanics
Yixiang Liu, Xiaoxiong Zha ⁎, Guobin Gong
ShenZhen Graduate School, Harbin Institute of Technology, ShenZhen 518055, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The damage mechanics is for the first time applied to the research on the Recycled-Concrete-Filled Steel Tube
Received 9 May 2011 (RCFST) and Concrete-Filled Steel Tube (CFST). A new damage model is provided and the recycled concrete
Accepted 21 October 2011 and ordinary concrete are idealized to be shunt-wound and series-wound spring in this paper. The energy-
Available online 21 November 2011
absorbing capacity of recycled concrete is worse than that of ordinary concrete, because the initial damage
of recycled concrete is more than that of the latter, which is verified by experiments. For RCFST and CFST,
Keywords:
RCFST
the initial damage of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete does not continue to grow, attributing to the
CFST tightening-ring force of steel tube. The energy-absorbing capacity of RCFST in the elastic range is much
Recycled concrete more than that of recycled concrete in the elastic range, and their ratio calculated based on the damage me-
Ordinary concrete chanics model in this paper is in agreement with the experimental results. Also, the difference of released
Damage mechanics strain energy between RCFST and CFST due to the initial damage based on the damage model is close to
Energy that based on experimental load–displacement curves of RCFST and CFST, which shows further feasibility
of applying damage theory to studying RCFST.
© 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction The damage of concrete under compression stress can be divided

into elastic and plastic damage [5]. The damage degree of concrete
Concrete-Filled Steel Tube (CFST) consists of steel tube and con- (D) can be described by the definition [5,6,7,8,12] as follows:
crete. CFST not only takes advantage of steel tube and concrete but
also makes up for their respective shortcomings. CFST have good ~
A
D ¼ 1− ð1Þ
properties such as high compressive strength, high yield strength A
and good seismic resistance [1,4]. According to the existing research
[2], the recycled aggregate could reduce strength and durability of where à is the actual area of the section and A is the initial area of the
the concrete. For this reason, the recycled aggregate has not been undamaged section. It is generally believed that concrete is destroyed
used for civil engineering on a large scale. But recycled aggregate under tension and shearing [12]. The tension is dominant [12], so the
used for CFST is better condition due to the contribution of the confin- shearing is ignored in this paper.
ing steel tube, which will improve strength and durability of recycled Li [12] has done some research on constitutive model of concrete
concrete [2,17]. The recycled aggregate can be potentially massively and provided stochastic damage constitutional law of concrete
used for civil engineering by means of Recycled-Concrete-Filled under uniaxial compression.
Steel Tube (RCFST). The study on RCFST only started recently
ε
[2,17,21]. ∫02 σ 2 ðxÞ dx ¼ we ðε2 Þ−2wD ðβε2 Þ ð2Þ
Since 1982, the damage mechanics has been used in the research
on concrete [5,6,12]. Currently, the model of the damage mechanics 1 2
we ðε2 Þ ¼ E ε ð3Þ
can be divided into two parts: macroscopical phenomenology model 2 2 2
and microscopic damage model [12].
βε2
wD ðβε2 Þ ¼ α∫0 E1 xDðxÞ dx ð4Þ

where ε2 is uniaxial compression strain of concrete, we(ε2) is strain

energy density when uniaxial compression strain of concrete reaches
⁎ Corresponding author. ε2 and wD(βε2) is the released energy density after transverse small
E-mail address: zhaxx@hit.edu.cn (X. Zha). springs break. In addition, E2 is vertical compressive modulus of

0143-974X/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jcsr.2011.10.023
144 Y. Liu et al. / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 71 (2012) 143–148

elasticity, E1 is transverse tensile modulus of elasticity, and E1 = E2. α where εμ is vertical ultimate strain and εe is the vertical elastic limit
is factor of the influence of shearing and β is Poisson's ratio. In this strain. D0 is D0o for concrete or D0r for recycled concrete. The elastic
paper, the damage mechanics will be used for the study on the range is considered and no plastic strain energy is taken into account
RCFST, CFST and recycled concrete for the first time. The damage me- in this research. β1 and β2 are Poisson's ratios of stages of elasticity
chanics will be used to distinguish not only the performance of RCFST and plasticity respectively.
and CFST but also the property of recycled concrete and concrete. According to formulas 4 and 7, the following formulas 9, 10 and 11
can be derived [10,14].
2. Theoretical research
βε
2wD ðβε2 Þ ¼ 2α∫0 e ExD0 dx
ð9Þ
2.1. The research of damage on recycled concrete and ordinary concrete ¼ αED0 ðβεe Þ2
 
Currently, there has been little literature work on recycled con- 1 2 1 1 2
K er ¼ E2 ðβε2 Þ −2wD ðβε2 Þþ E ε2  V
crete using damage mechanics. According to existing research 2 2  ð10Þ
[7,8,12], a new damage model is proposed, in which the recycled con- 1 2 2 1 2
¼ Er ðβεer Þ −αEr D0r ðβεer Þ þ ð1−D0r −0:1ÞEr εer  V r
crete and ordinary concrete are idealized to be shunt-wound and 2 2
series-wound springs in vertical direction and transverse direction,  
as shown in the following Fig. 1. 1 2 1 2
K eo ¼ E2 ðβε2 Þ −2wD ðβε2 Þþ E1 ε2  V
According to Fig. 1, the destruction of recycled concrete and ordi- 2 2  ð11Þ
nary concrete can be abstractly considered to be the breakage of all 1 2 2 1 2
¼ Eo ðβεeo Þ −αEo D0o ðβεeo Þ þ ð1−D0o −0:1ÞEo ε eo  V o
nondestructive transverse small springs. The existing research [3,9] 2 2
shows that the thickness of transition layer between recycled aggre-
gate and cement paste in recycled concrete is much larger than that where Ker and Keo are the absorbing energy of recycled concrete and
of transition layer in ordinary concrete. According to Xiao [9], there ordinary concrete during their elastic stages. The absorbing energy
is not only transition layer between recycled aggregate and new ce- is attributed to the extension of transverse small spring and pressure
ment paste but also transition layer between original aggregate and of vertical small spring. Some transverse small springs break, which
old cement paste in recycled concrete. The thickness of transition will result in more vertical small springs to stop working. Not only
layer between original aggregate and new cement paste in the con- the absorbing energy of transverse small springs but also the absorb-
crete is supposed to be about 0.5 mm [3,11]. The section height of ing energy of vertical small springs is relevant to initial damage. Vr
concrete is assumed to be H1 and the number of coarse aggregate in and Vo are the volume of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete.
the section of concrete is N1. εer and εeo are the elastic limit strain of recycled concrete and ordinary
So, the initial damage of concrete,D0o and the initial damage of concrete, respectively. Er and Eo are modulus of elasticity of recycled
recycled concrete, D0r, can be calculated by the following formulas 5 concrete and ordinary concrete. The effect of shearing is not consid-
and 6. ered in this paper, therefore, α = 1.0. The absorbing energy of
recycled concrete, Ker, is more than the absorbing energy of recycled
D0o ¼ 0:5  2  δ  N1 =H1 ð5Þ concrete, Keo, in their elastic stages.

D0r ¼ 4  0:5  2  δ  N1 =H1 ð6Þ 2.2. The research of damage on RCFST and CFST

where δ is the influence coefficient of damage, attributed to the fac- Because of the tightening-ring force of steel tube, concrete
tors other than coarse aggregate. destruction will not occur even when the stress is high. For RCFST
Bilinear damage model [22] will be properly changed and applied and CFST, initial damage of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete
in this paper. The initial damage is D0o or D0r. will not continue to grow, attributing to tightening-ring force of
steel tube. The initial damage of recycled concrete and ordinary
D ¼ D0 0≤ε≤β1 εe ð7Þ concrete in RCFST and CFST can result in strain energy being
released. Simplified model of RCFST and CFST is shown in Fig. 2.
Strain energy which RCFST or CFST will release is dependent only
β2 εμ ðε−β1 εe Þ on initial damage of recycled concrete or ordinary concrete. The ini-
D ¼ D0 þ   β1 εe ≤ε≤β2 εμ ð8Þ
ε β2 εμ −β1 εe tial damage will not increase with compressive stress [13], which
means that the ordinary concrete in the steel tube has less damage
than recycled concrete in the steel tube. Because of the difference of
initial damage between recycled concrete and ordinary concrete in
steel tube, the strain energy which the recycled concrete in steel

Fig. 1. Simplified model of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete under axial
compression. Fig. 2. Simplified model of CFST and RCFST underaxial compression.
 Y. Liu et al. / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 71 (2012) 143–148
tube releases is different from that the concrete in steel tube
releases.
According to formulas 2, 3 and 4, the following formulas 12–16
can be derived in the light of the damage of RCFST and CFST. wDrs
(βε2) and wDOs(βε2) are the strain energy density which the recycled
concrete and ordinary concrete in steel tube release respectively. Wr
and Wo are the strain energy which the recycled concrete and ordi-
nary concrete in steel tube release respectively.
u
wDOs ðβε2 Þ ¼ α∫0co Eo xD0Os dx
W o ¼ wDOs ðβε2 Þ  V o
u
wDrs ðβε2 Þ ¼ α∫0cr Er xD0rs dx
W r ¼ wDrs ðβε2 Þ  V r
ΔW ¼ W r −W o
uco ¼ U co =R
ucr ¼ U cr =R
D0os ¼ 0:5  2  δ  N2 =H2
Where Vr and Vo are volumes of recycled concrete and ordinary
concrete in steel tube respectively. Er and Eo are modulus of elastic-
ity of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete respectively. H2 is the
vertical height of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete in steel
tube. N2 is the number of coarse aggregate in the section of con-
crete. D0os is the initial damage of concrete in steel tube and D0rs
is the initial damage of recycled concrete in steel tube. The radial
displacements at the outside surface of the concrete cylinder and
recycled concrete cylinder, Uco and Ucr, can be obtained according
to Yu [16]. uco and ucr are radial strains at the outside surface of
the concrete cylinder and recycled concrete cylinder. R is outer ra-
dius of the concrete or recycled concrete cylinder. δ is equal to 1.0
in this paper.
Theoretically speaking, the initial damage of recycled concrete and
ordinary concrete in steel tube will result in breakage of some trans-
verse small springs, which will make recycled concrete and ordinary
concrete in steel tube release strain energy under compressive stress.
The difference of the released strain energy of recycled concrete and
ordinary concrete in steel tube, ΔW, can be calculated if the volume,
modulus of elasticity and initial damage of recycled concrete and or-
dinary concrete in steel tube are given.
The energy approach [12] combined with damage mechanics can
be used to compare the energy-absorbing capacity of RCFST with
that of recycled concrete. The modulus of elasticity of recycled concrete
and ordinary concrete in steel tube will remain unchanged [15]. In
general, energy-absorbing capacity of RCFST is much more than the
one of recycled concrete under compressive stress. According to formu-
las 2, 3, 4, 7 and 10, the following formula 20 can be derived.
1 2
E ε  V sr
T sr =T r ¼  2 sr 2  strain energy of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete in steel
1 2 1 2
E2 ðβε2 Þ −2wD ðβε2 Þþ E1 ðε2 Þ  V r
2 2
1 2
E ε  V sr
¼ 2 sr sr  the experimental absorbing energy of RCFST and CFST resulting
1 2 2 1 2
Er ðβεer Þ −αEr D0r ðβεer Þ þ ð1−D0r ÞEr εer  V r
2 2
where Tsr is the absorbing energy of RCFST under compressive stress
when the RCFST yields, Tr is the absorbing energy of recycled con-
crete under compressive stress when the recycled concrete yields,
145
Esr is the modulus of elasticity of RCFST and Er is the modulus of
elasticity of recycled concrete. In formula 20, εsr is the strain of
RCFST when it yields and εer is the strain of recycled concrete
when it yields.
3. Experimental research
3.1. Samples of recycled concrete, ordinary concrete and RCFST and CFST
ð12Þ Some samples of recycled concrete, ordinary concrete, RCFST
and CFST were prepared. The mix proportion of ordinary concrete
ð13Þ is the same as that of recycled concrete. The replacement ratio of
recycled coarse aggregate by mass is 100%. The fine aggregate of
ð14Þ recycled concrete is the same as that of ordinary concrete. The
grade of concrete is C40. Three RCFST and CFST samples were pre-
ð15Þ pared respectively. The external diameter of steel tube is 108 mm,
the thickness of steel tube is 4 mm and the height of steel tube is
ð16Þ 300 mm, for all the RCFST and CFST samples. Moreover, standard sam-
ples (100 mm× 100 mm× 100 mm) made of recycled concrete, ordi-
ð17Þ nary concrete were prepared. The samples' photos before and after
experiments are shown in Fig. 3.
ð18Þ
3.2. Experimental results for the samples of recycled concrete and ordi-
ð19Þ nary concrete
The load–displacement and stress–strain curves of standard sam-
ple of recycled concrete and ordinary concrete are displayed in Fig. 4.
According to Fig. 4, εer = 0.0027 and Er = 28,105 N/mm 2. The sec-
tion height of recycled concrete, H1, is 100 mm and N1 is 10. The ab-
sorbing energy of recycled concrete during its destruction, Ker, is
52 Nm by formula 10. Based on the same theory, the absorbing ener-
gy of concrete during its destruction, Keo, is 71 Nm. And Keo is larger
than Ker.
In Fig. 4, the area integral of load–displacement curves of recycled
concrete and ordinary concrete in the elastic stages, Ker′ and Keo′, are
45 Nm and 47 Nm respectively, which are absorbing energy resulting
from external forces. They are quite close to values of Ker and Keo
respectively.
In addition, the Ker and Keo based on formulas 10 and 11 are com-
pared with the experimental data in [18, 19, 20], as shown in Table 1.
It can be seen from Table 1 that the values of Ker and Keo based on the
damage mechanics model proposed in this paper are close to the area
integral of experimental load–displacement curves of recycled con-
crete and ordinary concrete respectively in the literature. It can also
be seen that Keo is larger than Ker, which agrees with the previous the-
oretical analysis.
3.3. Experimental results for the samples of CFST and RCFST
The load–displacement curves and stress–strain curves of the
samples of CFST and RCFST are displayed in Fig. 5.
The modulus of elasticity of recycled concrete and ordinary con-
crete in steel tube are 28,105 N/mm 2 and 35,075 N/mm 2 respec-
tively. uco = 0.00909 and ucr = 0.00927. Because of initial damage
resulting in breakage of some transverse small springs, the released
tube can be calculated according to formulas 13 and 15 respectively,
ð20Þ and thus ΔW is 1195 Nm. Meanwhile, the area integral of load–
displacement curves of RCFST and CFST up to the yield points is
from external force and their difference (ΔY) is 1200 Nm, which is
close to ΔW.
In addition, the ΔW can be calculated by formulas 13, 15, 16
and the ΔY of area integral difference of load–displacement curves
of RCFST and CFST can be obtained as shown in Table 2, according
to others' experimental results about RCFST and CFST [21, 22].
146 Y. Liu et al. / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 71 (2012) 143–148

Fig. 3. Samples' photos before and after experiments.

500 50000 Concrete

Concrete Recycled Concrete
Recycled Concrete
400 40000
Stress(KPa)

300
Load (KN)

30000

200 20000

100 10000

0 0
0.00 0.05 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25 0.30 0.35 0.40 0.0000 0.0005 0.0010 0.0015 0.0020 0.0025 0.0030 0.0035 0.0040
Displacement (mm) Strain

Fig. 4. Load–displacement curves and stress–strain curves of standard sample of concrete and recycled concrete.

From Table 2, it can be seen that the values of ΔW based on the 3.4. Experimental results for the samples of RCFST and recycled concrete
damage mechanics model proposed in this paper are in excellent
agreement with the ΔY of area integral of experimental load– The load–displacement curves of the samples of RCFST and recycled
displacement curves of RCFST and CFST in the literature. concrete are displayed in Fig. 6, where it can be seen that
Esr = 53,484 N/mm2 and εsr = 0.04. In addition, Vsr = 2,748,265 mm3
and Vr = 1,000,000 mm3. When the samples yield, the area integral of
load–displacement curves of RCFST and recycled concrete in Fig. 6 is
Table 1 different and their ratio is 14, which is close to their calculated value
Comparison with others' experimental data for recycled concrete and ordinary (11) by formula 20. Both theoretical analysis and experimental results
concrete.
show that RCFST has much more energy-absorbing capacity than
Serial Keo '
Keo Keo/ Replacement ratio of Ker '
Ker Ker/ recycled concrete, as expected.
' '
number Keo recycled coarse aggregate Ker
(Nm) (Nm) (Nm) (Nm)
4. Concluding remarks
A [18] 47 35 1.34 100% 31 28 1.11
B [19] 64 58 1.10 100% 39 58 0.67 (1) The damage mechanics is for the first time used for the
C [20] 12 15 0.80 100% 6 9 0.67
research on RCFST and recycled concrete. A new damage
 Y. Liu et al. / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 71 (2012) 143–148 147

1600
160000

1400 140000

1200 120000

1000

Stress (KPa)
100000
Load (KN)

800 80000
CFST
600 RCFST 60000 CFST
RCFST
400 40000

200 20000

0 0
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 4.0 4.5 5.0 5.5 6.0 0.000 0.005 0.010 0.015 0.020
Displacement (mm) Strain

Fig. 5. Load–displacement curves and stress–strain curves of sample of RCFST and CFST.

Table 2 damage does not grow under compression stress because of

Comparison with others' experimental data for RCFST and CFST.
tightening-ring force of steel tube. And the steel tube can ab-
Serial number Replacement ratio of ΔW (Nm) ΔY (Nm) ΔW/ΔY sorb much energy. Whereas, the damage of recycled concrete
recycled coarse aggregate and ordinary concrete without steel tube will continue to
A [2] 100% 133 140 0.950 grow under compression stress. Based on these reasons, the
B [21] 50% 143 137 0.891 energy-absorbing capacity of RCFST is expected to much
more than that of recycled concrete, as verified by the
experiments.

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