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Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018

PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

Factors Affecting on the Strengthening of Reinforced Concrete Beams Using


Steel Plate

Sumet Kiatmetha, BEng ing. Marshelius Theo Brajak, MSEng


Head of Engineering at HILTI Thailand Engineering Manager at HILTI Indonesia

Chuchai Sujivorakul, PhD Saran Wijitsombat, MEng


Assistant Professor at KMUTT University Graduate Student at KMUTT University

ABSTRACT

This research studied the parameters affecting on the strengthening of reinforced concrete beams
using steel plate. A steel plate was installed at the bottom of RC beams by fixing the anchors. The
size of beams was 15cm x 25cm in cross section and 2.70 m in length. The parameters used in the
study were: (a) 2 types of anchors used in fixing steel plate (mechanical anchor and adhesive
anchor); (b) with or without filling gap between steel plate and anchors with epoxy; (c) 2 different
patterns of installing anchors to fix steel plate with the beam, i.e. pattern 1: installing anchor only
on the shear span of the beam, and pattern 2: installing anchor on the entire length of the beam.
The beams were investigated by using four-point bending test with a span length of 2.50 m. An
LVDT was installed at the bottom and mid-span of the beam to measure deflection, and strain
gauges were also attached at different locations on the surface of the beam to measure strain of
materials during applying force. The test results showed that the use of steel plate to strengthen
RC beams could enhance significantly bending strength and stiffness of the beam. Beams with
adhesion anchors performed higher bending strength and stiffness than those with mechanical
anchors. Furthermore, the beams filling the gap between the steel plate and anchors with epoxy
would increase the bending strength and stiffness of the beam, and resulted to less deflection of
the beam. In addition, the beams using pattern 2 of anchor installation performed significantly
lower the stiffness and the bending strength of the beam than those using pattern 1 of anchor
installation.

Key Word : Strengthening / Reinforced Concrete Beam / Steel plate / Anchor


Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

1. INTRODUCTION 2. METHODOLOGY

For reinforced concrete structures, the main 2.1 Materials


structures are foundation, column, beam and slab.
These structures are designed to serve all loads 1) Ready-mixed concrete - compressive
and keep the building in a good serviceability strength of 280 ksc (cylinder)
conditions. Sometimes, the structures might have 2) 2 Steel rebars - 2 types of rebars are used
to take more weights than the design due to many - deformed bar (DB10, SD40)
reasons, such as changing the usage from one to - rounded bar (RB6, SR24)
be another, or building up more area, or changing 3) Steel plate - 50mm x 4mm in cross section
the position of the non-structural elements. As a and 2.40m in length, SS400
result, some structures in the building need to be 4) Anchoring system - products of Hilti are
strengthened in order to carry more loads. The divided into two types.
structural strengthening has several methods, - mechanical anchors is HST M12x115/20
such as increasing the size of the structure or - adhesion anchors is HIT-HY 200-R
attaching stronger material to the existing 5) and anchor rod is HAS-E M12x110/28
structure. 6) Filling cavity set of M12 - products of Hilti.
Beams is one of the most important building
elements. Beams carry load from the floor and 2.2 Preparation of beam specimens
walls, and they will transfer the load to column.
If the beam is damaged, the building may collapse The process of preparation for testing specimens
immediately. When the structural floor has to is as follows.
carry more loads, it is necessary to strengthen the
existing reinforced concrete slabs and beams to 1) Casting six RC beam samples with cross-
take the additional loads. The strengthening of sectional size of 150 mm x 250 mm, and 2.70
RC beams has several ways. The most popular m in length. Every beam is reinforced with 2-
method and convenience to work is strengthening DB10 rebars on the top and bottom of section
the beam by installing steel plates on the outer with concrete cover of 20 mm as shown in
surface of the beam and fixing them with anchor Fig. 1. The details of extra preparation and
bolts. Puttipong [1] had reported that the strengthening for each beam are shown in
installation of steel plates on the outer surface of Table 2.
the concrete beams can resist more bending and
shear forces, which is less complicated and use
less space for installing steel plates. Wanchai [2]
also had found that the installation of steel plates Fig. 1 Reinforcement detail of beam samples
at the bottom of beam could increase the bending
strength, and installation of steel plates at the side
2) Installation of a steel plate and fixing it with
of the beam will not only increase the bending
anchors according to the Hilti installation
strength, but also enhance the shear capacity of
standard, as shown in Table 1 and Fig. 2
the beam.
There are many factors that affect the
Table 1 Hilti installation anchor bolt standard
strengthening RC beams with steel plates, such as
the type of bolts, filling gap of steel plate with Type of Concrete Hole Steel Torque
epoxy, patterns of installing anchors to fix steel Anchor hole dia. depth plate (N.m)
plate with the beam, and etc. Cheevin and Suchart (mm) (mm) hole dia.
(mm)
[3] had found that strengthening of the RC beam Mechanical 12 95 14 60
with steel plate and fix with adhesion bolt could Adhesion 14 110 14 -
resist to flexural force more than those RC beams
with steel plate and attach with epoxy only. In the
past researches, they may not cover all factors.
Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

Table 2 Beam specimens used in this research


NO. Steel plate Type of bolt Anchor Spacing Filling gap ID of Specimens
thk. (mm) Dia.(mm) (mm)
B1
B2 4 Adhesion 12 250 No Fill P4ch12@25NF
B3 4 Adhesion 12 250,center No Fill P4ch12@25cNF
B4 4 Mechanic 12 250 No Fill P4mec12@25NF
B5 4 Adhesion 12 250 Fill P4ch12@25Fd
B6 4 Mechanic 12 250 Fill P4mec12@25Fd

a) Installing anchor only on the shear span of the beam

b) Installing anchor on the entire length of the beam


Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

3) Installation of strain gauges on the steel plate and RC beam surface at the specified positions as shown
in Fig 3.

Fig. 3 Position of installing strain gauges on the beam


Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

2.3 Testing
2.4 Prediction of the maximum load
The beams were investigated using a four-points
bending test with a span length of 2.50 m as
The maximum flexural moment applied to the
shown in Fig. 4. Applied load gradually increases
at the center of the beam and divided into two beam can be predicted using strain compatibility
point. An LVDT was installed at the bottom and and equilibrium equations as shown in Fig. 5.
mid-span of the beam to measure deflection, and
strain gauges was attached at different locations
to measures strain of materials during applied
load.

where Ts = Tension force of steel bar, kg


Tsp = Tension force of steel plate, kg
d1 = Distance from compressed surface
to tensile steel bar, cm
d2 = Distance from compressed surface
to tensile steel plate, cm
Fig. 4 Four-points bending test of beam specimen

Fig. 5 Strain and force distribution on the RC beam reinforced with a steel plate
Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Fig. 6 The relationship between applied load and deflection at midspan of the beams.

Based on Fig 6, it shows that strengthening the span (B2). Very good agreement is observed in
RC beam with a steel plate (B2-B6) can enhance RC beams without steel plate (B1), while RC
significantly the bending strength compared with beams with steel plate give more maximum load
RC beam without steel plate (B1-Control). The from testing than maximum load from prediction.
beam that can resist the most bending strength is
B5, i.e. RC beams with steel plate fixed with The stiffness of the RC beam at an applied load
adhesion anchors only on the shear span of beam can be obtained as
and filling gap between steel plate and anchors
with epoxy. It is also seen that fixing steel plate
with adhesion anchor (B2, B5) lead to higher
bending strength and stiffness than those with Table 3 Calculation of beam stiffness at the
mechanical anchors (B4, B6). For the beams applied load of 4,000 kg
filling gap between steel plate and anchors with
NO. Load Deflecti K
epoxy (B5, B6), they can resist more bending (kg) on (mm) (kg/mm)
load and have more stiffness than those beams B1 4,000 12.34 325.00
without filling gap with epoxy (B2, B4). B2 4,000 7.14 557.97
Moreover, the beam with the pattern for installing B3 4,000 8.25 487.39
anchors on the entire length (B3) has less bending B4 4,000 8.57 467.76
B5 4,000 4.90 814.88
strength and stiffness than the beam with the B6 4,000 5.45 733.92
pattern for installing anchor only on the shear
Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

c) ID of strain gauges and anchors of the beam


B4, B5, and B6

Fig. 8 Position and ID of the strain gauges and


anchors
Fig. 7 Stiffness Ratio of beam specimens
Table 3 shows an example of calculation of
stiffness at an applied load of 4,000 kg. It is seen
that, for a certain level of load, B1 has the most
deflection. While the strengthened RC beams
with steel plate, the deflection of the beam is
significantly reduced. This means that RC beams
with steel plate have more stiffness, as shown in
Fig. 7. It can be seen that the beam B5 has the
biggest stiffness. For the beam with filling gap
between steel plate and anchors using epoxy (B5,
B6) have more stiffness than those beams without
filling gap (B2, B4). Moreover, the beams with
adhesion anchors (B2, B5) have more stiffness
than those beams with mechanical bolts (B4, B6).
In addition, the beam has pattern of installing
anchor on the entire length have less stiffness Fig. 9 Strain of beam B1
than those beams having pattern of installing
anchor only on the shear span. The position of the strain gauges and anchors are
specified in the ID as shown in Figure 8. Figure 9
shows the strain at RC beam B1 (control) on the
top and bottom of the concrete surface. It is seen
that the strain of the top beam is negative
(compression) and the strain reaches 0.003 at
maximum load, which is according to the theory
of RC. The strain of the bottom beam is positive
a) ID of strain gauges and anchors of beam B2
(tension zone) at beginning. However, when the
RC beam cracks, the strain releases and becomes
negative.
Fig. 10 to 14 show strain values from the strain
gauge on the top and bottom of RC beam with
steel plate (B2, B3, B4, B5, and B6). The strain
gauges are attached to the concrete surface at the
b) ID of strain gauges and anchors of beam B3 center of beam as shown in Fig. 8(a) to 8(c). The
strain in steel plate at bottom is always positive
(tension zone) in which the position at midspan
of beam (Bottom 4) will exhibit the most strain.
Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

At this position, it is observed the yielding of steel


plate at strain more than 0.002. In the other
positions (Bottom 3, 2, 1) strain will decrease in
sequence, whereby the steel plates in other
positions are still under tension force and no
yielding of steel is not observed. For strain of the
top beam is negative (compression zone) and the
strain in some beams reached 0.003.

Fig. 13 Strain in steel plate of beam B5

Fig. 10 Strain in steel plate of beam B2

Fig. 14 Strain in steel plate of beam B6


Figures 15 to 18 show shear stress that occur in
each anchor in the position specified in Figures
8(a) to 8(c) respectively. It can be seen that shear
stress in the anchor while steel plate yields at the
strain of 0.002 is more than shear stress in anchor
bolt while the applied load is about 50% of
maximum load. The shear stress in different
Fig. 11 Strain in steel plate of beam B3
positions of anchors are not equal in both cases,
which is different from the theory that all anchors
should have the same shear stress. Maximum
shear stress in anchors of all tested beams is less
than shear strengths of anchors, therefore the
anchors will not be failed in shear. Moreover, it
is observed that anchor No.4 trends to exhibit the
most shear stress. This might be from the position
of anchor No.4 is nearest to the midspan of the
beam, whereby the highest tension in steel plate
transferred to the anchor.

Fig. 12 Strain in steel plate of beam B4


Seminar HAKI 2018 August 28-30, 2018
PT. Hilti Nusantara Jakarta, Indonesia

4. CONCLUSIONS
The following conclusions could be made:
1) Strengthening RC beams using steel plate can
enhance bending strength and stiffness of the
beams.
2) Strengthening RC beams with steel plate and
using adhesion anchors could lead to the
better bending strength and stiffness than
those using mechanical anchors.
3) Strengthening RC beams with steel plate and
Fig. 15 Shear Stress in anchor of B2 filling the gap between the steel plate and
anchors with epoxy would enhance the
stiffness of the beams. As a result, less
deflection of the beam would be obtained.
4) Strengthening RC beam with steel plate, and
having pattern of installing anchor only on
the shear span could lead to more bending
strength and stiffness than those beams of
installing anchor on the entire length.
5) The anchors at the position near the midspan
of the beam trend to have the most shear
stress, because this position is in the area of
Fig. 16 Shear Stress in anchor of B4 highest tensile zone in steel plate which is
transferred to the anchor.
5. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you to Hilti Thailand Co., Ltd. for the


support of this research.

6. REFERENCES

[1] Putthipong Haleerattanawattana, 2008,


“Strengthening Reinforced concrete beams by
steel plate installation”, TCA e-magazine, Vol.2,
Fig. 17 Shear Stress in anchor of B5 issue 5, December 2008, pp. 1.

[2] Wanchai Teadbunchornsuk, 1994,


“Strengthening of Reinforced concrete beams
with steel plate”, Master of Engineering Thesis
Structural engineering Faculty of Engineering
Khon kaen University.

[3] Cheevin Limsiri and Suchart Pattha, 2007,


“Flexural Strengthening of Reinforced concrete
beams by externally steel plates”, The 12th
National Convention on Civil Engineering, 2-4
Fig. 18 Shear Stress in anchor of B6
May 2007, Amarin Lagoon Hotel Phitsanulok,
Volume 7 (STR) pp. 105-107. (In Thai)

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