Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

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Performance of glass ®ber reinforced plastic bars as a reinforcing material

for concrete structures
S.H. Alsayed*, Y.A. Al-Salloum, T.H. Almusallam
Department of Civil Engineering, King Saud University, P.O. Box 800, Riyadh 11421, Saudi Arabia

Abstract
The increasing use of ®ber reinforced plastic (FRP) bars to reinforce concrete structures necessitates the need for either developing a new
design code or adopt the current one to account for the engineering characteristics of FRP materials. This paper suggests some modi®cations
to the currently used ACI model for computing ¯exural strength, service load de¯ection, and the minimum reinforcement needed to avoid
rupturing of the tensile reinforcement. Two series of tests were conducted to check the validity of the suggested modi®cations. The ®rst series
was used to check the validity of the modi®cations made into the ¯exural and service load de¯ection models. The test results of the ®rst series
were also analyzed to develop two simple models for computing the service load de¯ection for beams reinforced with glass FRP (GFRP)
bars. The second series was used to check the accuracy of the modi®cation suggested into minimum reinforcement model.
Test results of the ®rst series indicate that the ¯exural capacity of the beams reinforced by GFRP bars can be accurately predicted using the
ultimate design theory. They also show that the current ACI model for computing the service load de¯ection underestimates the actual
de¯ection of these beams. The two suggested models for predicting service load de¯ection accurately estimated the measured de¯ection
under service load, and the simpler of the two pertains better predictions than those of the models available in the literature. Test results of the
second series reveal that there is an excellent agreement between the predicted and recorded behavior of the test specimens, which suggests
the validity of the proposed model for calculating the required minimum reinforcement for beams reinforced by GFRP bars. q 2000 Elsevier
Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: A. Glass ®bers; Reinforced concrete structures

1. Introduction reinforcing material for concrete structures. The major

obstacles are the high initial cost, low modulus of elasticity,
Lately, ®ber reinforced plastic (FRP) materials such as lack of ductility and absence of design guidelines. The ®rst
glass ®ber reinforced plastic (GFRP) rebars, as a reinforcing of these obstacles is greatly in¯uenced by the manufacturing
material for concrete structures, have received a great deal process. However, different low cost techniques are
of attention among many engineering societies worldwide. currently under development by many fabricators. The
Many engineers consider FRP as one of the most innovative second and third obstacles (low modulus of elasticity and
material that may overcome the inherited de®ciency of lack of ductility) are considered the major engineering
reinforcing concrete structures by steel rebars in harsh drawbacks of the FRP materials. This is because when a
environments due to corrosion. concrete element is reinforced by FRP rebars, it may
In comparison with steel, FRP have higher resistance to undergo larger de¯ection and suffer less margin of safety
corrosion, higher tensile capacity, and lower weight. They in comparison to that of its counterpart concrete element
are also non-conductive for electricity and non-magnetic. reinforced by steel bars. To overcome the fourth obstacle,
Thus, for structures built in or close to seawater or at similar a bulk of laboratory and ®eld data is needed.
corrosive environment, where electromagnetic neutrality It is worth mentioning that the currently available design
and/or electric insulation are required, or exposed to deicing formulae for designing reinforced concrete (RC) elements
salts, FRP may become invaluable. as adopted by many design codes were originally developed
Unfortunately, FRP are not free from hindrances that with regard to that reinforcement is provided by steel. Thus,
need to be resolved before they can be prescribed as a they may not be equally applicable to design concrete
element reinforced by FRP rebars. On account of that, and
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 196614676925; fax: 196614677008. to bene®t from the advantages of FRP materials, currently
E-mail address: [email protected] (S.H. Alsayed). utilized design formulae must be reviewed considering the
1359-8368/00/$ - see front matter q 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S 1359-836 8(99)00049-9
556 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

properties of FRP materials. Then, the formulae can be the beam section, and f is the strength reduction factor
modi®ed, if necessary, to assure adequate safety and (f ˆ 0:90 for ¯exure). For GFRP-RC beams, the ¯exural
serviceability of the FRP concrete structures. strength equation can be written as:
The aim of this paper is to present the major results of an  
extensive research project that was carried out to study the fpy
Mn ˆ Ap fpy d 1 2 0:59rp 0 1†
actual behavior of concrete beams reinforced by GFRP bars fc
and subjected to transverse (¯exure) loading. The work
checks the suitability of using the existing ACI beam design where,
equations for ¯exure and de¯ection when reinforcement is Mn ˆ nominal moment capacity of a section, N mm
provided with GFRP bars and suggests the needed modi- Ap ˆ area of GFRP rebars in tension region, mm 2
®cations to the equations in order to account for the engi- fpy ˆ pseudo yield tensile strength of GFRP rebars, MPa
neering properties of GFRP bars. The study also investigates d ˆ distance from extreme comp. ®ber to centroid of
the condition of the required minimum GFRP reinforcement tension reinforcement, mm
to avoid the catastrophic tensile failure of the beams. Modi- rp ˆ ratio of tension reinforcement ˆ Ap =bd
®cations to the currently used models are suggested based f 0c ˆ compressive strength of concrete, MPa
on the test results of full size beams along with the b ˆ width of concrete section; mm:
equivalent data from the literature, whenever available.
This is the same equation based on the ACI method after
Further, the predicted service load de¯ections using the
substituting the pseudo yield strength (fpy) of GFRP rebars
suggested models are compared with the measured de¯ec-
for the yield strength of steel (fy) and the area of GFRP
tions at midspan for these beams and their corresponding
reinforcement (Ap) for the area of steel (As). This equation
predicted values using the ACI model as well as those
models available in the literature. is actually based on tensile failure type in the tension
It is hoped that the output of this study will help in paving reinforcement. As the tensile failure due to breakage of
the road for a design code for FRP material, which will help the GFRP bars is more brittle than that due to crushing of
concrete, a compressive failure for GFRP-RC section is
practitioners in designing and constructing concrete
preferred and the nominal moment strength can be written
structures with FRP material that will ful®ll the strength
as:
and serviceability requirements and extend the useful
service life of the infrastructure.  
a
Mn ˆ Ap fps d 2 2†
2

2. Flexural strength where Mn is the nominal moment strength, Ap is the GFRP-

reinforcement area ˆ rp bd†; r p is the GFRP-reinforcement
Before incorporating the GFRP bars into the design codes ratio, b is the beam width, d is the effective depth, fps is the
and standards, extensive research is needed to determine the computed stress at the GFRP bars which corresponds to fs of
values and limitations of design parameters. However, to the steel. The maximum value for fps is the usable stress limit
minimize the possibility of having failure due to breakage of GFRP or the so-called pseudo yield tensile strength, fpy,
of the GFRP bars, which is more brittle than failure due to which corresponds to fy of the steel. The fpy is assumed to be
crushing of concrete [1], researchers recommended some equal to 0.67 fpu, (the factor of safety, f pu =f py ˆ 1:5; equals
reduction factors to be applied to the GFRP ultimate tensile to that usually considered against rupturing steel bars), fpu is
strength, fpu. Faza et al. [2] recommended that the maximum the ultimate tensile strength of GFRP and a is the stress-
permissible strength, fpy, to be 0.80 of the ultimate strength. block depth, a ˆ b1 c:
Nanni [3] suggested that the strength reduction factor, f , to Knowing that in case of compression failure, as shown in
be taken as 0.70 and the minimum ®ber plastic reinforce- Fig. 1, the strain in the reinforcement, 1 ps, will be less than
ment ratio, r pmin, to be the larger of 1.33r pbal (rppbal
 is the that of the pseudo yield limit, 1 py, which corresponds to 1 y
balanced ®ber plastic reinforcement ratio) or 0:24 f 0c =fpu (to of the steel. The 1 ps can be expressed in terms of the
assure that fM n . M cr )Ðin general, researchers [2±6] concrete strain in the extreme compression ®ber, 1 cu, and
recommended the use of some allowance (reduction factor) the distance from that ®ber to the neutral axis, c, as:
ranging from 0.70 to 0.80, that is to account for the
possibility of experiencing undesired tensile failure type d 2 c†
1ps ˆ 1cu 3†
of GFRP bars. In other words, they have de®ned a pseudo c
yield point of fpy ranging from 0.70 to 0.80fpu for the FRP
and
reinforcement.
The ¯exural strength of a singly-reinforced beam fps ˆ Ep 1ps 4†
section according to the ACI-Code provisions [7]
requires Mu , fMn in which Mu is the required factored From the equilibrium requirements, the compression
moment strength, Mn is the nominal moment strength of force C ˆ 0:85b1 f 0c bc should be equal to the tension force
 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567 557

Fig. 1. ACI ¯exural strength for singly reinforced RC section (with GFRP bars).

T ˆ rp bd fps : Thus, the distance c can be found as: Ig ˆ the moment of inertia of the uncracked transformed
2s 3 section (gross concrete section).
 2
mr m r
c ˆ 4 m rp 1
p p 5d
2 5† Earlier results by the authors [9,10] showed that the
2 2
current ACI model [7] underestimates the de¯ections in
where m is a material parameter, equals to FRP beams and therefore it needs to be revised to account
Ep ecu †= 0:85b1 f 0c †; and Ep is the modulus of elasticity of for the properties of FRP materials. There is, however, some
the GFRP material. research effort to develop new formulae or modify the
currently used ones to account for the properties of FRP
bars. Some of these formulae have already been suggested
3. Serviceability requirements and become available in the literature. It is, however, useful
to investigate the accuracy of these models before they can
The de¯ection requirement of the ACI-Code Table 9.5(b) be used by practitioners for ®eld applications.
limits the computed de¯ection, D , to a speci®ed maximum Faza and Ganga Rao [11] derived an expression for the
permissible value, D a, which depends on the span length of effective moment of inertia for FRP-RC beams loaded at the
the beam and the type of the member. Therefore, for third points. This model is based on the assumption that
simply-supported beam of span L loaded by two equal concrete section between the point loads is fully cracked,
concentrated loads (P=2 each) symmetrically placed about while the end sections are partially cracked. Therefore, the
the beam center line as shown in Fig. 2, the maximum cracking moment of inertia, Icr, is used in the middle
de¯ection D computed at the beam center can be written as: third section of the beam, and the current ACI-Code
Ps equation Ie, is used in the end sections. Thus, the model
Dˆ 3L2 2 4s2 † 6† can be written as:
48Ec Ie
where L is the span of the beam, P is the total service 23Icr Ie
Im ˆ 8†
concentrated load divided into two concentrated loads P=2 8Icr 1 15Ie
each applied at a distance s from the support, Ec is the where Im is the modi®ed moment of inertia valid for two
modulus of elasticity of concrete, and Ie is the effective
moment of inertia of the beam section.
According to ACI-Code provisions, the effective moment
of inertia, Ie, can be determined as follows:
  "   #
Mcr 3 Mcr 3
Ie ˆ Ig 1Icr 1 2 7†
Ma Ma
where,
Mcr ˆ the cracking moment,
Ma ˆ the maximum service moment,
Icr ˆ the moment of inertia of the cracked transformed Fig. 2. The simple beam subjected to two equal concentrated loads symme-
section, trically placed about the beam centerline.
558 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

concentrated point loads applied at the third points on the the possibility of tensile failure of the rebars. Hence,
beam. This means that the smaller the distance between fpy ˆ 0:67fpu :
loads, the smaller the portion that is assumed to be fully Therefore,
cracked. Therefore, it is expected that the assumption in p0
this model will produce higher values than the corre- f
rpy $ 0:25 c : 12†
sponding actual values of the effective moment of inertia fpu
when the distance between loads is less than 1/3 of the span.
Thus, to avoid the possibility of the brittle failure of
However, comparison between the measured and the corre-
GFRP rebars and to assure that fMn . Mcr ; the minimum
sponding predicted de¯ections using this model showed that
GFRP reinforcement ratio is assumed to be the larger value
the predicted de¯ections correlated well with the measured
obtained from Eq. (10) (r p-bal) or Eq. (12). Further, since the
ones at service load level when the middle third of the span
failure of GFRP bars is of brittle type, therefore, there is no
is assumed to be fully cracked regardless of the distance
upper limit for reinforcement ratio. However, the maximum
between the two point loads [12].
GFRP reinforcement ratio is governed by the practical
Another modi®ed expression for the effective moment of
considerations, e.g. spacing between bars and maximum
inertia for simply supported beams reinforced with FRP bars
size of aggregate.
was proposed by the ACI Committee 440 [13]. It is
It should be noted that composite materials, in general,
expressed as follows:
and GFRP in particular are susceptible to degradation
  
Ig Mcr 3 initiated by moisture, temperature, and some loading and
Ie ˆ aIcr 1 2 aIcr 9† environmental conditions. However, such conditions were
b Ma
not accounted for in the aforesaid equations.
in which a and b are reduction factors equal to 0.84 and 7.0,
respectively. These factors account for the reduced area of
the compression section when the applied moment reaches 5. Test program of ¯exural capacity and serviceability
the cracking moment. When the ®rst term of Branson's
expression is divided by b and the second term is multiplied 5.1. Test specimens
by a , Eq. (9) is obtained. The results of the comparison
using this model showed that the predicted de¯ections at A series of tests were conducted to study the ¯exural
service load level were overestimated for some beams [12]. capacity and the serviceability requirements of GFRP-RC
beams. A total of ®fteen (15) beams categorized into ®ve
groups were tested in this program. Each group was
4. Minimum and maximum reinforcement requirements composed of three identical specimens. While group I
beams were reinforced with steel bars referred to as control
The ductility requirements of the ACI-Code provisions
specimens, the other four groups were reinforced with
pratio rs ˆ As =bd; to a lower and upper limits
limit the steel
GFRP rebars. Group I beams were reinforced with steel
of rs-min ˆ f 0c =4fy (fy is in MPa) and rs-max ˆ 0:75rs-bal ;
rebars (control specimens), group II beams were reinforced
respectively, in which r s-bal is the balanced steel reinforce-
with GFRP rebars considering the same dimensions of the
ment ratio. Substituting the material properties of GFRP, the
control specimens and designed in accordance with the ACI
balanced reinforcement ratio expression for GFRP, r p-bal,
Code ultimate design theory for compression failureÐ
becomes:
presented earlierÐto have the same capacity of group I
0:85b1 f 0c 0:003Ep beams. The third group (group III) was designed such that
rp2bal ˆ 10†
the ¯exural strength, serviceability and ductility require-
fpy 0:003Ep 1 fpy
ments according to ACI Code are satis®ed. Group IV and
To avoid failure due to concrete rupture, the minimum V beams were provided with different depths and reinforce-
GFRP reinforcement ratio should be larger than a certain ments, designed such that the ¯exural strength, service-
value to assure that the nominal ¯exural strength, f Mn, of ability and minimum reinforcement requirements are
the RC beam is greater than the strength of plain concrete satis®ed. The serviceability requirement is such that the
beam, Mcr, i.e. central de¯ection (computed using ACI Code with 5.5
fMn . Mcr 11† power in Branson's expression) at service loading is almost
the same as that of group I beams.
The required reinforcement ratio to satisfy the above All beams in this series were 2900 mm long, provided
condition can be derived as follows: with B 8 mm diameter steel stirrups at 100 mm center to
For a concrete beam reinforced with steel rebars [8]; center, tested simply supported over a span of 2700 mm, and
p
f0 loaded by two concentrated loads placed at equal distance
r $ 0:168 c f 0c and fy are in MPa† (100 mm) from the beam centerline as shown in Figs. 2 and
fy
3. The GFRP rebars were of E-glass type (E-glass 76.14%,
For GFRP a factor of safety of 1.5 is assumed against resin 22.18%, ®ller 1.26%, ultra violet 0.05% and catalysts
 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567 559

Fig. 3. Test setup.

Table 1
Beam details of the ®rst series of test specimens

Beam Type of Reinforcement Reinforcement Overall Width Effective

group reinforcement details area, depth, b (mm) depth,
A (mm 2) h (mm) d (mm)

I STEEL 3B14 462 210 200 160.0

II GFRP 4B19 1134 210 200 157.5
III GFRP 4B12.7 507 260 200 210.7
IV GFRP 2B19 567 300 200 247.5
V GFRP 4B19 1134 250 200 197.5

Table 2
Material properties of the ®rst series of test specimens

Group Bar diameter (mm) f 0c (MPa) (concrete) fy (MPa) (Steel) fu (MPa) (GFRP) E (MPa)

I 14 31.3 553 ± 200000

II 19 31.3 ± 700 35630
III 12.7 31.3 ± 886 43370
IV 19 40.7 ± 700 35630
V 19 40.7 ± 700 35630

0.37%) and were manufactured through pultrusion process for the ®ve groups of beams are shown in Fig. 4. The results
in which the ®bers are passed through a resin bath and clearly show the in¯uence of reinforcing bar type and cross-
pulled through a die of the bar diameter. Further details of sectional dimensions on the overall load±de¯ection rela-
the cross-sections for the beams in this series and the tionship. While group I and II beams are almost identical
materials properties are summarized in Tables 1 and 2. except for the type of reinforcing bars, a noticeable increase
in group II beams Es =Ep . 4† de¯ection due to the replace-
5.2. Test results ment of steel rebars by relatively lower modulus GFRP
rebars. An increase in the cross-sectional depth decreases
The average measured load±central de¯ection relationships the de¯ection of the beam. This can be clearly seen in the
560 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

Fig. 4. The average measured load±de¯ection relationships for the ®ve groups of beams of the ®rst series of test specimens.

load±de¯ection relationships of groups III, IV and V beams in depth include reducing the amount of needed GFRP
compared to group II beams as shown in Fig. 4. bars by 55% (4B 19 mm versus 4B 12.7 mm), increasing
The predicted loads and central de¯ections at service load the ¯exural capacity by 32% (54.7 MPa versus 72.2 MPa),
(in this paper, the service load is assumed to be about 35% reducing the de¯ection at same load (20 kN) by 31%
of the ultimate load) using ACI-Code procedure [7] for the (10.64 versus 7.38). Reducing the amount of GFRP bars
®ve groups of beams are shown in Tables 3 and 4, respec- implies great reduction in the overall cost of construction.
tively, along with the corresponding measured results. The For instance, when the costs of concrete, steel, GFRP
results show that groups I and II attained almost the same and form work are assumed to be US$ 100/m 3, 610/ton,
load capacity. This supports the validity of the procedure 9150/ton and 2/m 2, respectively, the reduction in cost
used to design the GFRP-RC beams, i.e. the ACI Code of the GFRP-RC beams of group III as compared to
ultimate design theory for compression failure. The effect that of group II is about 40% [14]. Thus, the increase
of replacing steel rebars by GFRP rebars on the de¯ection of in the overall cost that may result from replacing steel
beams can be clearly seen in the ®gure and in the tables. The by GFRP bars to reinforce concrete structures can be
increase in de¯ection is actually less than what was tremendously reduced by increasing the depth of the
expected. For instance, although Es =Ep is larger than 4, the cross-section. This, however, may not be the ideal solu-
ratio of the central de¯ection of the GFRP-RC group II tion for multi-story structures as the reduction in their
beams to that of the steel-RC group I beams at service cross-sectional dimensions is, in most cases, an insisted
load is 1.96. However, still such increase in de¯ection at desired.
service load implies that the de¯ection will control the The results of Fig. 4 also show that groups IV and V
design of intermediate to long span structural elements attained almost the same load capacity. This again supports
reinforced by GFRP bars. The difference between the the validity of the procedure used to design the GFRP-RC
expected and the measured ratios may be ascribed to the beams for strength. In other words, the ultimate ¯exural
interaction effect of the composite and also to the loading capacity of GFRP-RC beams can be reasonably estimated
con®guration. using Whitney's rectangular stress block. Furthermore,
The results reported in Table 4 also show the bene®t these GFRP-RC beams of groups IV and V have almost
of increasing the depth and decreasing the reinforcement the same behavior at the service load level.
of group III beams compared to those of group II beams. It is interesting to mention that due to the factor of
The increase of the overall depth was 24% (260 mm safety used against the possibility of experiencing tensile
versus 210 mm for group II). Bene®ts of such increase failure of GFRP rebars fpy ˆ 0:67fpu †; all GFRP-RC
beams considered in this study showed concrete com-
pressive failures. Typical failure of the test specimens is
Table 3 shown in Fig. 5.
Measured and calculated ultimate load
While the results show that there is a good agreement
Beam group Ultimate load, Pn, (kN) Load ratio (ACI/measured) between the experimental and theoretical (ACI-Code)
results for loads and de¯ections for beams reinforced with
Measured ACI
steel bars (group I), the results shown in Table 4 for other
I 56.5 55.6 0.98 groups clearly present the fact that the current ACI model
II 54.7 51.0 0.93 prediction for the de¯ection of beams reinforced by GFRP
III 72.2 65.9 0.91 bars is under-estimated. This clearly shows that there is a
IV 94.7 92.5 0.98 need to modify the current ACI equation for de¯ection
V 91.2 84.2 0.92
prediction.
 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567 561

Table 4
Central de¯ection values at service load

Beam group Ultimate load, Pn (kN) Service load, Ps (kN) Central de¯ection (mm) De¯ection ratio (ACI/measured)

Measured ACI

I 55.6 20 5.44 5.18 0.95

II 51.0 20 10.64 8.14 0.77
III 65.9 26 11.32 5.67 0.50
IV 92.5 40 14.23 5.57 0.39
V 84.2 33 11.81 7.73 0.65

5.3. De¯ection prediction models The experimental values of the effective moment of
inertia determined from Eq. (13) were used in Eq. (14).
As pointed out earlier, there is a need to modify the current The regression analysis was performed on the results for
ACI equation to predict de¯ections under service loads. To do service load range. The results suggest that the average
so, the experimental results obtained in this study were value of the power (m) for GFRP-RC beams can be taken
analyzed. The experimental values of the effective moment approximately as 5.5 rather than 3 as suggested by Branson
of inertia Ie were determined using Eq. (6) as follows: for steel-RC beams [7]. Thus, the suggested model
1 (Model-A) can be considered as a modi®ed Branson's equa-
P exp† s
Ie exp† ˆ 2
3L2 2 4s2 † 13† tion to determine the effective moment of inertia for beams
24Ec D exp† reinforced by GFRP bars. It can be written as:
Model A:
and from Eq. (7), the power (m) can be written as: "
    #
! Mcr 5:5 Mcr 5:5
Ie 2 Icr Ie ˆ I g 1Icr 1 2 15†
log Ma Ma
Ig 2 Icr
mˆ   14†
Mcr Another model (Model B) is suggested based on the
log
Ma analysis of the experimental data of Ie =Icr versus Ma =Mcr

Fig. 5. Typical failure of the test specimens.

562 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

Fig. 6. The ‰Ie =Icr Š versus ‰Ma =Mcr Š for the GFRP-RC beams.

for beams reinforced by GFRP bars. The results for where

Ma =Mcr greater than 1.0 are plotted in Fig. 6. The regres-  
2 Ma
sion analysis which was performed on these results sug- a ˆ 1:40 2 : 16c†
gests that the effective moment of inertia can be taken as 15 Mcr
follows:
Model B: 5.4. Model validation
Ma The values of the effective moment of inertia Ie deter-
Ie ˆ aIcr for 1:0 , , 3:0; 16a†
Mcr mined using the above-suggested models are plotted versus
Ma =Mcr for each group of beams in Figs. 7±10. They are
plotted besides the experimental values determined using
Ma Eq. (13) and those of the ACI model. The results for those
Ie ˆ Icr for . 3:0; 16b†
Mcr beams reinforced with GFRP bars shown in Figs. 7±10

Fig. 7. The effective moment of inertia versus Ma =Mcr for group II beams.
 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567 563

Fig. 8. The effective moment of inertia versus Ma =Mcr for group III beams.

clearly indicate that there is an abrupt change in the actual The predicted central de¯ection for each group of beams
effective moment of inertia determined from the experimen- is calculated using a spreadsheet program. All models
tal results, Eq. (13), once the applied moment exceeds Mcr. considered (®ve models) are summarized in Table 5. The
The value of Ie(exp) drops to a value slightly above Icr. This is measured and predicted results for GFRP-RC beams, groups
attributed to the effect of the low modular ratio for these II through V, using these models at service load level are
beams due to low modulus of elasticity of the GFRP bars. summarized in Table 6. The ratio of the predicted with
This is another indication that Branson's equation is not respect to the measured service de¯ection is also shown in
recommended for beams reinforced with GFRP rebars. Table 6. The error in each model that represents the percen-
The predicted de¯ections at service load level are tage difference between the predicted and the measured
computed for models available in the literature as well as values of short-term service de¯ections for the four groups
for the two suggested models. The results are compared with are presented graphically in Fig. 11. The results show the
the corresponding experimental results. accuracy of the two models suggested in this study along

Fig. 9. The effective moment of inertia versus Ma =Mcr for group IV beams.
564 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

Table 5
The models used to predict the effective moment of inertia for beams reinforced by GFRP bars

Model Expression Suggested by

 3 "  3 #
ACI-318 Mcr Mcr ACI Committee 318 [7]
Ie ˆ Ig 1Icr 1 2
Ma Ma

Faza and Ganga Rao 23Icr Ie Faza and Ganga Rao [11]
Im ˆ
8Icr 1 15Ie
in which Ie is computed according to ACI-318
  "   #
ACI-440 Ig Mcr 3 Mcr 3 ACI Committee 440 [13]
Ie ˆ 1aIcr 1 2
b Ma Ma

 5:5 "  5:5 #

A Mcr Mcr Current study
Ie ˆ Ig 1Icr 1 2
Ma Ma

  
B 2 Ma M Current study
Ie ˆ 1:40 2 Icr for 1 , a , 3
15 Mcr Mcr

Ma
Ie ˆ Icr for .3
Mcr

with that of Faza and Ganga Rao [11]. The results also show conducted to investigate the minimum reinforcement
that although model B is simple and much easier to use, it is requirement for GFRP-RC beams. A total of six (6) beams
the most accurate one among all other models. were tested in this program. They were categorized into two
groups. Each group was composed of three identical speci-
mens. Group (MR-1) beams were reinforced with minimum
6. Test program of minimum reinforcement condition amount of GFRP reinforcement, while group (MR-2) beams
were reinforced with reinforcement less than the minimum
6.1. Test specimens amount of GFRP rebars.
The cross-sections of beam specimens of Groups (MR-1)
As explained earlier, this part of test program was and (MR-2) were 200 £ 210 mm 2, and 2320 mm long.

Fig. 10. The effective moment of inertia versus Ma =Mcr for group V beams.
 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567 565

Fig. 11. The error percentage in each model for the four groups of GFRP-RC beams at service load level.

Fig. 12. The average measured load±de¯ection relationships for the two groups of beams of the second series of test specimens.

Table 6
Measured and predicted central de¯ections using all models at service load levels

Group P-Service (kN) D measured (mm) Model D predicted (mm) D predicted/D measured

II 20 10.64 ACI-318 8.14 0.77

Faza and Ganga Rao 10.76 1.01
ACI-440 12.16 1.14
A 11.35 1.07
B 10.95 1.03
III 26 11.32 ACI-318 5.67 0.50
Faza and Ganga Rao 11.14 0.98
ACI-440 14.06 1.24
A 10.64 0.94
B 12.18 1.07
IV 40 14.23 ACI-318 5.57 0.39
Faza and Ganga Rao 12.59 0.88
ACI-440 16.19 1.14
A 11.62 0.82
B 14.19 1.00
V 33 11.81 ACI-318 7.73 0.65
Faza and Ganga Rao 10.49 0.89
ACI-440 11.97 1.01
A 11.13 0.94
B 10.83 0.92
566 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567

Table 7
Beams details and material properties of the second series of test specimens

Group Reinforcement Ap (mm 2) fpu (MPa) EP (MPa) f 0c (MPa) b (mm) h (mm) d (mm)

MR-1 2B12.7 53.4 886 43370 39.6 200 210 160.7

MR-2 2B9.5 142.5 876 42020 39.6 200 210 162.2

Table 8 0.003. When the applied loads exceeded that, the stress in
The reinforcement ratios of the two groups rebars exceeded the pseudo yield limit .0:67f pu †: When
p the strain in concrete reached 0.003, the stress in the rebars
Group r p-bal 0:25 f 0c =fpu r min r used r /r min
reached about 800 MPa which is slightly less than the ulti-
MR-1 0.00782 0.001776 0.00782 0.007885 1.0083 mate value of 876 MPa. As the applied load increased, the
MR-2 0.00778 0.001796 0.00778 0.004392 0.5645 rebars failed in tension and the beam was cut into two parts.
These results support the theoretical derivations that were
Group (MR-1) was reinforced with 2#4 (B 12.7 mm) GFRP presented earlier in this paper.
bars (r ˆ 1:008rmin ). Group (MR-2) beam specimens was
reinforced with 2#3 (B 9.5 mm) GFRP bars (r ˆ
0:565rmin ). The two groups were provided with B 8 mm 7. Conclusions
steel stirrup at 100 mm center to center, tested simply
supported over a span of 2120 mm, and loaded by two The validity of using the current ACI-318 code of
concentrated loads placed at equal distance (100 mm) from practice for both strength and serviceability requirements
the beam center line. Further details of the cross-sections for for designing concrete beams reinforced with GFRP rebars
the beams in this series and the materials properties are was investigated. The results revealed the following
summarized in Tables 7 and 8. remarks:
1. The ¯exural capacity of concrete beams reinforced
6.2. Test results by GFRP bars can be accurately estimated using the
ultimate design theory (when failure occurs due to
The measured load±de¯ection curves for specimens crushing of concrete in the compression side) which is
of the two groups are shown in Fig. 12. The results also applicable to design of concrete beams reinforced by
show that the reinforcement ratio has a signi®cant in¯u- steel bars (over reinforced sections).
ence on the behavior of GFRP-RC beams. The ®rst 2. Due to the low modulus of elasticity of GFRP rebars
group (MR-1), which was designed such that the rein- EGFRP =Esteel < 0:25†; de¯ection criterion may control
forcement is minimum, failed in compression (crushing the design of intermediate and long beams reinforced
of concrete) as was expected. The second group (MR- with GFRP rebars. The current ACI equations, developed
2), in which the reinforcement is less than the minimum for steel-reinforced concrete beams, highly under-
failed in tension due to GFRP rebars tensile failure, estimates the actual de¯ection of the concrete beams
rupture of bars. reinforced by GFRP bars.
The results shown in Table 9 indicate that MR- 1 beams 3. Based on the experimental results, two simple empirical
in which r ˆ rmin ˆ rbal ; the stress in the GFRP bars models are suggested to predict the actual service load
reached almost 0.67fpu when the strain in the extreme de¯ection. The accuracy of the models pertains good
compression ®ber of concrete reached 0.003. This result agreement with measured values. They are simple to
was expected since the reinforcement ratio used in use and provide, in most cases, better prediction than
beams of this group equals to the balanced reinforcement those by other models available in the literature.
ratio. This failure is a balanced failure (it is indeed a 4. To avoid the possibility of a catastrophic failure due to
compression failure since 1cu ˆ 0:003 and fpy ˆ 0:67fpu ). reinforcing rebars rupture, a model to estimate the
On the other hand, MR-2 beams in which r , rmin ; the minimum required reinforcement ratio is suggested.
stress in the rebars reached 0.67fpu when the strain in The model was checked experimentally and pertained
the extreme compression ®ber of concrete was less than good agreement with test results.

Table 9
Theoretical results of beams with different reinforcement ratios of GFRP bars

Group Reinforcement details fpu (MPa) Fpy (MPa) ( ˆ 0.67 fpu) fs (MPa) 1c ˆ 0:003 e c at fpy Pn (kN)

MR-1 2B 12.7 886 593.6 590.9 0.00303 46.64

MR-2 2B 9.5 876 586.9 800.2 0.001549 27.2
 S.H. Alsayed et al. / Composites: Part B 31 (2000) 555±567 567

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Acknowledgements Harper and Row, 1992. 1030 pp.
[9] Al-Salloum YA, Alsayed SH, Almusallam TH, Amjad MA. Some
The authors acknowledge the support of King Abdulaziz design considerations for concrete beams reinforced by FRP bars.
City for Science and Technology (KACST), who funded the Proceedings of The First International Conference on Composites in
Infrastructure (ICCI'96), Tucson, Arizona, 1996. p. 318±31.
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Structures.º bars. Proceedings of The Second International Conference on the Use
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