There is an ongoing research at The University of Texas at Arlington on Evaluation of Strengthening Two-Way Slabs with Regular and Pre-saturated CFRP. It is common that many structures degrade or deteriorate over time due to various factors, and this consequently has an impact on the flexural strength. However, it is impractical to re-construct each structure which experiences deterioration, therefore non-destructive methods such as CFRP wrapping have been introduced to assist in significantly increasing their strength. Currently, tests have not been conducted to evaluate the practical application of pre-saturated CFRP wrapping on two-way slabs. While studies have shown that the use of regular CFRP to increase the strength of two-way slabs have been successful, there are some drawbacks. Debonding is a major issue when using regular CFRP. As a result, this research aims to evaluate the use of pre-saturated CFRP to strengthen two-way slabs and the results will be compared to that of regular CFRP.

Two full scale two-way reinforced concrete slabs will be strengthened using CFRP (regular and pre-saturated respectively). A load test will be conducted to verify the strength gained by these slabs and their results will be compared. Load-deflection relationships and ultimate load capacity will be obtained from the experiment. A finite element model will be developed using ABAQUS. The model will be analyzed, and the results obtained will be compared with the experimental results. This will assist in validating the results obtained by conducting the experiment.

Download Poster