Effect of layer variations on CFRP strengthened steel circular hollow members under bending: numerical studies

Abstract

The number of carbon fibre reinforced polymer (CFRP) layer and their orientation generallyaffect the strength and stiffness of the steel circular hollow section (CHS) members primarily when they are subjected to bending. In this study, numerical investigation is carried out to find the effect of number and orientation of CFRP composites layer on strength and stiffness of CHS members under bending. In numerical investigation, cohesive element is adopted to model interface element (adhesive) and an 8-node quadrilateral in-plane general-purpose continuum shell is used to model CFRP elements. The validity of the FE models is ascertained by comparing the ultimate load, stiffness and failure mode from experimental results. The results of FE analyses show that the strength and stiffness increase with the increase of number of CFRP layer. The three layer configured CFRP strengthened steel CHS beams are found cost effective with respect to strength increment than four layer configured CFRP strengthened steel CHS beams. KEYWORDSSteel CHS beam, CFRP, wrapping layer variation, numerical simulation. NOTATIONS

CFRP strengthened CFST columns under vehicular impact

“…However, in recent years, researches are focusing on strengthening/retrofitting metallic structures with CFRP wrapping. Extensive experimental tests and numerical analyses are conducted to explore the potentiality of CFRP strengthened steel members subjected to static loadings (Fawzia et al 2006;Fawzia et al 2007;Shaat and Fam 2009;Fawzia 2013;Kabir et al 2014;Fawzia and Shahanara 2014;Kabir et al 2015). However, research is very limited on the behaviour of CFRP strengthened steel and CFST structures under dynamic loadings such as transverse impact loading (Chen et al 2014;Alam et al 2014;.…”