Fatigue Strength of Steel Girders Strengthened with Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer Patch
Publication: Journal of Structural Engineering
Volume 129, Issue 2
Abstract
Fatigue sensitive details in aging steel girders is one of the common problems that structural engineers are facing today. The design characteristics of steel members can be enhanced significantly by epoxy bonding carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRP) laminates to the critically stressed tension areas. This paper presents the results of a study on the retrofitting of notched steel beams with CFRP patches for medium cycle fatigue loading A total of 21 specimens made of A36 steel beams were prepared and tested. Unretrofitted beams were also tested as control specimens. The steel beams were tested under four point bending with the loading rate of between 5 and 10 Hz. Different constant stress ranges between 69 and 379 MPa were considered. The length and thickness of the patch were kept the same for all the retrofitted specimens. In addition to the number of cycles to failure, changes in the stiffness and crack initiation and growth were monitored during each experiment. The results showed that the CFRP patch not only tends to extend the fatigue life of a detail more than three times, but also decreases the crack growth rate significantly.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Structural Engineering
Volume 129 • Issue 2 • February 2003
Pages: 186 - 196
Copyright
Copyright © 2003 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Dec 20, 2000
Accepted: Jun 11, 2002
Published online: Jan 15, 2003
Published in print: Feb 2003
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