EXPERIMENTAL STUDY ON FLEXURAL BEHAVIOR OF RC BEAM STRENGTHENED WITH SELF-REPAIRING SMA/ECC COMPOSITES MATERIALS

In order to improve the bearing capacity and damage self-repairing capacity as well as the safety and serviceability of existing RC members, a reinforcing method for strengthening RC beams using Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) and Engineered Cementitious Composites (ECC) was proposed. Four kinds of test beams were designed and fabricated, and the effects of different materials on the failure modes, bearing capacity, energy dissipation and self-repairing capability of the experimental beams were analyzed through the low-cycle cyclic loading test. The results show that SMA/ECC composite reinforced beam has significantly improved the bearing capacity, the ductility and deformation capacity as well as the self-repairing capability. Finally, by considering the ECC tensile strain hardening characteristics, a calculation method of the flexural capacity of ECC reinforced beams was proposed, and the calculated results were in good agreement with the experimental data.