Journal of Wuhan University of DOI 10.

1007/s11595-006-3529-9

Technology-Mater. Sci. Ed.

Sept 2007

529

Bond Properties and Experimental Methods of Textile Reinforced Concrete

(1. State Key Laboratory of Coastal and Offshore Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China; 2. Research Department, Beijing Institute of Architectural Design, Beijing 100045, China) Abstract: Textile reinforced concrete(TRC, for short) allows the low size production and offers a high effectiveness of the reinforcement by using continuous roving instead of short-chopped fibers. However, whether textiles can cooperate with concrete very well depends on the bond between them. In this paper, the bonding mechanism that the stress was transferred from fine concrete to textile was analyzed, and the influences of the initial bond length of textile, the surface treatment of textile , the strength and workability of concrete as well as the level of prestressing force on bond behavior were investigated on the basis of pull-out tests. The results reveal that with initial bond length increasing, the maximum pull force increases, and increasing concrete strength and improving workability of concrete matrix, epoxy resin impregnating and sand covering of textile as well as prestressing textile can obviously increase the bond strength between the textile and concrete. Key words: textile; bond; pull-out test

XU Shilang1, LI He2*

1 Introduction
In the past, the research on fiber reinforced concrete(FRC, for short) mainly focused on shortchopped fibers. Due to the random distribution of shortchopped fibers in concrete, the strength of the fibers is usually not fully used and, therefore, a comparatively high degree of reinforcement is needed. Hence it seems appropriate to reinforce concrete with roving or textile materials oriented in line with the occuring stresses of concrete. To insure the bond between textile and concrete, a kind of high performance fine concrete is developed as the matrix of TRC. TRC shows some obvious advantages, such as high carrying capacity and ductibility, preventing magnetizing, no corrosion, thin size and light self-weight as well as convenience for construction, and so on. Even though the idea of TRC is not completely new, basic mechanisms regarding bond, durability and load-carrying capacity are not understood in detail so far. The collaborative organization of TRC in European and American came into existence in 2002, the beginning of human exploring for TRC. In this organization, the properties of TRC are investigated
(Received: Nov. 13,2006; Accepted: Apr.14,2007) XU Shilang(): Prof.; Ph D; E-mail: Slxu@dlut.edu.cn * Corresponding author: LI He(): Ph D; E-mail: lh2050@126. com Funded by the Key Program of the National Natural Science Foundation of China(No.50438010)

from micro-level to macro-level, from material characteristic to structural characteristic, and from basic components to the assembly of structural system. Many new experimental technologies have been adopted, such as acoustic-emission technology that reflects the stress state of roving at the interface between concrete and textile and measures the valid bond length[1], fiberoptic sensors that measures the strain of roving [2], as well as digital photogrammetry, and computer tomography that measures the deformation and crack development of structure[3]. Recently, Shilang Xu and Hans W Reinhardt studied the bond properties between high performance fine concrete and carbon textile, and established the base of TRC for structural application [4]. In this paper, to study bond properties between textiles and concrete, pullout tests were performed using carbon textiles, and the influences of the initial bond length of textile, the surface treatment of textile, the strength and workability of concrete as well as the level of prestressing force on bond behavior were investigated. The results of study show that increasing concrete strength and improving workability of concrete matrix, epoxy resin impregnating and sand covering of textile as well as prestressing textile can obviously increase the bond strength between textile and concrete.

2 Experimental
2.1 Concrete matrix To investigate the influence of the strength and

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workability on the bond, four different matrices were developed, viz. C1,C2,C3,C4. To insure the matrices penetrating into textile successfully, the biggest grave size was limited, and it was 1.2 mm. The content of the drier of these matrices is same. Every cubic-meter matrix included 472 kg Portland cement, 168 kg fly ash, 35 kg silica fume, 460 kg fine sands(grave size 0-0.6 mm), and 920 kg fine sands(grave size 0.6-1.2 mm). To achieve different strength and workability, the dosages of super plasticizer and water-binder ratios of those matrices were different. The detail and properties of concrete are shown in Table 1. 2.2 Textile The common textiles include carbon, glass and Aramid fiber fabric. There are many ways that textiles are made from roving, of which three ones are primary: weft insertion warp knitted textile, short weft warp knitted textiles, and woven textiles(plain weave); The textile structures differ by the way the yarns are

combined together. The geometries of textiles influence the bond between concrete and them[8]. As carbon fiber was very expensive, to save experimental materials, a kind of woven textile whose warp yarns are made of carbon fiber and weft yarns made of glass fiber was adopted in this test. The research[1] showed that the pronounced weft effects do not occur so that the reinforcing effect of weft for concrete can be omitted. Due to the damage of a part of filaments in fabrication and construction, after the yarn is loaded, the damaged filaments rupture firstly, and then the intact ones rupture, which makes the reinforcing effect distract and is called as tensile weakening. So the tensile strength of a yarn is much smaller than that of a filament. Furthermore, as the concrete cannot penetrate into the yarn and among the filaments, only the outer filaments can develop better bond with concrete and the force is transferred to inner one by friction. When the yarn is loaded,

outer filaments deform earlier and greater than inner ones[9], which is called as shear lag. To decrease or avoid the phenomena of tensile weakening and shear lag, epoxy resin impregnating of textile is necessary before it is embedded in concrete. Epoxy resin can penetrate into the yarn and among the filaments, and make the filaments conglutinate as a whole, viz, a yarn. To develop the bond, the sands were scattered on the surface of a part of textile before epoxy resin hardens, and epoxy resin hardens, the sands were stuck on it in

this test. The tensile strength of a yarn is not the sum of those of all filaments, and need to be measured. As the shape of the cross section of the yarn varies and the width of it is very small, common clamping devices cannot fix it up. Moreover, the surface of the yarn is scraggy after impregnated by epoxy resin, the strain gauge can not be stuck on it. So a special clamping device and a special strain jig were designed for the yarn[10]. Two elastic steel slices are fixed on a rigid base, and four strain gauges are pasted respectively on the upper and the nether of steel slices. Four wires, viz, A, B, C, D are connected with four strain gauges according to the whole bridge circuit. Before the strain jib is used, the relationship that the voltage changes along with the corresponding change of distance between elastic steel slices is calibrated. Hence two small steel blocks with notches are fixed on the yarn, and then the distance between them is recorded. After that, the strain jigs get stuck on the notches of steel blocks. So the change of the distance between the two elastic steel slices divided by the original distance between them

Journal of Wuhan University of

Technology-Mater. Sci. Ed.

Sept 2007

531

is the mean strain. The tensile force can be gotten by a tensile sensor. The tensile force divided by academic area is the stress and the stress divided by the mean strain is Youngs modulus. The test approved that the tensile strength and ultimate strain were very discrete but Youngs modulus was close to the theory value. The ultimate tension of a yarn is between 1 kN to 2 kN. The mean value is 1.5 kN, and the coefficient of variability is 41%. On the other hand, the ultimate strain of a yarn is between 0.01 and 0.02. The mean value is 0.015, and the coefficient of variability is 62.5%. 2.3 Specimens To get a representative specimen, thin test specimens without prestressing force were sawn from a plate with dimensions of 900 mm900 mm20 mm. The textile fabric was placed in the mid cross-section. The nonprestressed plates were manufactured by placing a 10 mm thick layer of concrete in a mould and putting the textile layer on top of it. Another layer of 10 mm was then cast and slightly vibrated by a special vibrator which has been developed for this purpose. Thin prestressed specimens were cast according to these dimensions of 600 mm100 mm20 mm. Firstly, the textile fabric was placed in the mid cross-section of the mould, and then was prestressed, after that the concrete was cast into the mould. A kind of clamping device was specially developed for this purpose. The prestressing force was implemented with the rolling motion of a screw bolt, and the measure of the prestressing force can be gotten by a tensile sensor

behind the clamping device. 2.4 Experimental process The test set-up is shown in Fig.1. Before testing, the specimen was glued with an epoxy resin into sawtooth shaped steel plates and fixed with a bolt to the testing machine. An electro-mechanical machine(made by Jinan Shijin Group Co. Ltd, WAW300) was used to perform the tests. The loading rate was 1.0 mm/min.

3 Results and Discussion

The influences of strength and workability of concrete on bond in different initial lengths are shown in Fig.2. From Fig.2, one can see both the peak value of pullout force of matrix C1 and the work that pullout force of matrix C1 does to pull out the yarn completely are greater than those of C2, which indicates the higher the strength of concrete, the better the bond. On the other hand, though the strength of C2 is higher than

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that of C3, the bond between C3 and the yarn is better than that between C2 and the yarn because of the selfcompacting capacity of C3. Fig.3 indicates that epoxy resin impregnating and sand covering of textile can heighten the peak value of pullout force obviously when the initial bond length is same. However, after the peak value, the pullout force of the yarn impregnated by epoxy resin and covered with sands nearly descends to 0, which indicates the majority of filaments have ruptured so as not to bear the load. The peak value of pullout force increases with initial bond length increasing, which is shown in Fig.4. If the quantity of short-chopped fibers that were mixed into concrete is proper, the crack of matrix can be limited, as a result of which the bond can be developed and the peak value of pullout force can be heightened. However, the heightened extent of the peak value of pullout force due to short-chopped fibers is lower than that due to epoxy resin impregnating and sand covering, which is shown in Fig.5. From Fig.6, one can see that the peak value of pullout force is about 1 700 N for the prestressing force 600 N/yarn, above 1 400 N for the prestressing force 400 N/yarn and below 1 400 N for the prestressing force 0, which can be explained by the Poissons ratio effect and the bonding effect of prestressing force that leads to an increase of the frictional bond strength between yarn and concrete as well as among the inner filaments, and an increase of the contact zones of the inner filaments[1,4], which can be seen from Fig.7.

action among filaments can be omitted. If a textile is covered with sands after being impregnated by epoxy resin, the peak value of pullout force can be increased, which is due to the increasing of friction. With the initial bond length increasing, the peak value of pullout force increases. Furthermore, it is advantageous for bond to increase the strength of concrete and develop the workability of concrete. Finally, as it leads to the increase of both friction and contact zones of the inner filaments, the prestressing force increases the bond strength, too.

References
[1] H-W Reinhardt, M Krger. Vorgespannte Dnne Platten aus Textilbeton[C]. Textilbeton-1. Fac-kolloquium der Sonderforsc hungsbereiche, 528 und 532, Aachen, 2001:165-174 [2] M Molter, J Hegger, W Habel, et al. Characterization of Bond Performance of Textiles in Cement-Matrices Using Fiber-Optic Sensors[C]. Proceedings of SPIE, 2002, 4 694:253-258 [3] H G Maas, U Hampel, M Schulze. Photogrammetrische and Computertomographische Erfassung von Eformationen, Rissentwichlungen und Strukturvernderungen bei Belastungsversuchen von textilverstrkten Probekrpern[C]. Proceedings of the 2nd Colloquium on Textile Reinforced Structures(CTRS2), Dresden, 2003: 187-200 [4] S L Xu, M Krger, H-W Reinhardt, et al. Bond Characteristics of Carbon, Alkali Resistant Glass and Aramid Textiles in Mortar[J]. Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering, ASCE, 2004, 16(4): 356-364 [5] N Nagamoto, K Ozawa. Mixture Proportions of Self-compacting High-performance Concrete[C]. High-performance Concrete: Design and Materials and Advances in Concrete Technology, ACI SP-172,1997: 623-636 [6] H Okamura, K Ozawa. Mix-design for Self-compacting Concrete[J]. Concrete Library of JSCE,1995, 25: 107-120 [7] K Ozawa, N Sakata, H Okamura. Evaluation of Selfcompactability of Fresh Concrete Using the Funnel Test[J]. Concrete Library of JSCE,1995, 25: 59-75 [8] A Peled, A Bentur. Mechanisms of Fabric Reinforcement of Cement Matrices: Effect of Fabric Geometry and Yarn Properties[C]. Proceedings of the 2nd Colloquium on Textile Reinforced Structures (CTRS2),Dresden,2003 [9] M Konrad, R Chudoba, K Meskouris, et al. Numerical Simulation of Yarn and Bond Behavior at Micro- and MessoLevel[C]. Proceedings of the 2nd Colloquium on Textile Reinforced Structures (CTRS2),Dresden,2003 [10] H T Ren. Study on Basic Theories and Long Time Behavior of Concrete Structures Strengthened by Fiber-Reinforced Polymers[D].Dalian:Dalian University of Technology, 2003

4 Conclusions
TRC is a new kind of reinforcing elements, and understanding the bond nature is the first stage for structural application. However, as textile is made of many filaments and these filaments cannot bear the load in the same phase, the reinforcing efficiency of TRC will be decreased. So epoxy resin impregnating of textile is necessary. After impregnated by epoxy resin, the textile can be seen as rigid thin fabric and the inner