Abstract:
In order to improve the crack resistance capacity, and avoid the brittle failure of the fiber-reinforced polymer composite (FRP) reinforced concrete beams, a mixed-use of glass fiber-reinforced polymer composite (GFRP) bars and crumb rubber concrete was adopted in beam components under bending. Finite element analysis software ABAQUS was used to simulate the flexural behavior of GFRP-reinforced crumb rubber concrete beams. Parametric studies were conducted to study the influence of rubber content, reinforcement ratio, concrete strength grade, and cross-section height on the flexural behavior of GFRP-reinforced crumb rubber concrete beams. The results show that the cracking load of beam increases with the increase of rubber content. The cracking load of beam increases by 29% when the rubber content of concrete is 15%. Increasing the reinforcement ratio could improve the cracking load and flexural strength of the beam. The cracking load of the GFRP-reinforced crumb rubber concrete beam with rubber replacement ratio of 10% has a 15% increase and the flexural strength of the beam has 85% increase induced by increasing the diameter of the GFRP bar from 10 mm to 18 mm. However, when the reinforcement ratio reaches a certain value, the influence is no longer obvious. Increasing the crumb rubber concrete strength can improve the cracking load and flexural strength of the beam. Increasing the crumb rubber concrete strength from C25 to C40 results in approximately 53.7% increase in cracking load, and more than 23% increase in flexural strength. The beams with higher section height are more likely to meet the requirements at normal serviceable limit state.