Field Durability Study of Vinyl-Ester–Based GFRP Rebars in Concrete Bridge Barriers
Publication: Journal of Bridge Engineering
Volume 23, Issue 12
Abstract
Val-Alain Bridge on Highway 20 East is the first bridge in Canada in which the concrete deck and barrier walls were fully reinforced with vinyl-ester–based glass-fiber–reinforced polymer (GFRP) bars. Built in 2004, this bridge was considered as the prototype for bridges built thereafter by the Québec Ministry of Transport (MTQ). In 2015, concrete core samples containing GFRP bars were taken from the bridge barrier wall to assess the durability of the high-performance concrete and bars. The mechanical and physicochemical properties of the concrete and GFRP bars were assessed and compared with the material properties measured during bridge construction. In addition, the durability of the GFRP bars was assessed based on the performance of the reference samples from the same production lot of the bars used in reinforcing the Val-Alain Bridge. The results reveal no significant changes in the physicochemical properties as well as microstructure of the concrete and vinyl-ester–based GFRP bars sampled from the bridge barriers after 11 years of service exposure to wet–dry cycles, freeze–thaw cycles, and deicing salts.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to express their special thanks and gratitude to the Québec Ministry of Transportation (MTQ), the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), the Canada Research Chair in Advanced FRP Composite Materials for Civil Structures, the NSERC Research Chair in FRP Reinforcement for Concrete Infrastructure, the Fonds de la recherche du Québec en nature et technologies (FRQ-NT), and the technical staff of the materials/structural lab in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Sherbrooke. The authors are also grateful to Nexus Metrology, a division of Trikon Technologies (Toronto), for performing the µCT scan, and they would like to mention that the GFRP bars (production lot MC-15-008) were manufactured by Pultrall Inc. (Thetford Mines, Québec).
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Published In
Journal of Bridge Engineering
Volume 23 • Issue 12 • December 2018
Copyright
© 2018 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Nov 7, 2017
Accepted: Jun 12, 2018
Published online: Sep 25, 2018
Published in print: Dec 1, 2018
Discussion open until: Feb 25, 2019
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