LABORATORY TESTING OF STEEL FIBER CONCRETE PRISM FOR TENSION IN BENDING

Abstract. Laboratory bending tests of concrete and steel-fiber-concrete prisms were carried out. The concrete matrix for all prisms is made of a concrete mixture of the same composition with a coarse aggregate size up to 10 mm and a water-cement ratio that allows correct mixing of the ready mixture with fiber, so that the latter is evenly distributed over the sample volume. Fiber reinforcement is 1% for all three types of fiber, a fiber made of the same steel with an ultimate strength of 1335 MPa, fiber length 50 mm, diameter 1 mm is used. Fibers differ only in shape, which makes it possible to compare test results across series without correction factors. Concrete samples without fiber are considered as control samples. As a result of laboratory tests, data sets were obtained and analyzed, which are presented in the form of diagrams. Different types of steel fiber show different increases in the load at the beginning of cracking and load-bearing capacity. The most profitable from this point of view is the addition of anchor fiber to concrete, the least – wave fiber. However, the presence of any of the considered steel fibers in the mixture significantly increases the load-bearing capacity of the sample. In addition, the type of destruction of such a sample changes from brittle to viscous. We also studied the deformability of samples with different fiber reinforcement and plotted the dependence of the relative longitudinal strain on the load. Before the crack formation begins, there is a direct proportionality between the load and the strain with the appearance of cracks, the slope of the graphs changes sharply. When the load-bearing capacity is lost, steel fiber-reinforced concrete samples are restrained from final destruction. The use of steel fiber in concrete on average increases the crack resistance by 40%, and the load-bearing capacity by 64%. Compared with samples without fiber reinforcement, samples with anchor fiber show an increase in load-bearing capacity by 89%, and crack resistance by 61%. When using flattened fiber, these values are 56% and 32%, and for wave fiber – 47% and 25%, respectively. The use of steel fiber in the manufacture of concrete mix avoids the brittle nature of destruction.