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The reuse, recycling, or disposal of increasing quantities of post-consumer plastic materials, particularly Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) bottles, is an ongoing global challenge due to the low natural degradation rates of such products. This paper thus experimentally studied the effect of reusing post-consumer plastic bottles as soil-filled reinforcement for the soil above shallow buried unplasticized Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC-U) pipes using a laboratory model. The hypothesis was that a plastic bottle wall would operate to contain soil within them, causing the bed to behave in a similar manner to a block load distribution zone above the shallow buried pipe. Backfilling was done as the soil-filled plastic bottles were vertically placed within the soil bed at the proper depth, and the influence of various factors, such as the soil-filled bottle-reinforced area's depth of placement (u) and width (b) were examined under static loading. According to the test data, a bottle-reinforced bed is exceptionally stiff, giving very high soil-bearing capacity with even minor soil settlement above buried pipes. The optimum depth of placement and width of the plastic bottle-reinforced layer were 0.50B and 2.08B, respectively, where the bearing capacity ratio (BCR) of the soil was improved by a factor of ∼1.48. Using waste plastic bottles was thus seen to improve project economy overall as well as minimising any costs of waste bottle disposal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using steel jackets around reinforced concrete columns is a widespread technique for static and seismic retrofitting applications. The dimensionless interaction diagrams for reinforced concrete columns strengthened with steel angles are not attempted yet. Thus, this paper presents the formulation of dimensionless interaction diagrams for reinforced concrete columns strengthened with steel angles and strips. The axial loads and uniaxial bending moments are calculated using the plastic stress distribution method, and then the dimensionless interaction diagrams are generated. These diagrams enable analysis (estimation of the column load carrying capacity) and design (required amount of steel reinforcement) of such columns. Numerous examples are given to explain the Use of the new proposed diagrams. These examples have shown that the new proposed charts are straightforward in structural analysis and design applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]