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High‐performance fibre reinforced concrete represents a promising alternative to conventional reinforced concrete for the construction of prestressed precast girders for road bridges. Specifically, all shear reinforcement is replaced by the use of steel fibres, which leads to important savings from the material and economical perspectives. Therefore, reliable shear formulations are required for these specific cases. In an effort to evaluate the accuracy of code expressions, this paper presents a database collecting 80 experimental shear tests on prestressed fibre reinforced concrete beams without stirrups. After illustrating its main characteristics, this database is used to verify the conservativeness and accuracy of shear formulation according to several codes and recommendations: i) Model Code 2010, ii) draft version of Model Code 2020, iii) draft version of the new Eurocode 2, and iv) Spanish National Code. The evaluation, carried out through the calculation of the model safety factor, indicated that the application of all shear formulations is largely conservative, leading to less unsafe tests than the desired 5% fractile. The relation between model safety factors and mechanical parameters is then investigated. Finally, the results obtained for the developed database are compared with those achieved from two larger databases of beams with similar features but without prestress. The comparison clearly proves the greater conservatism of code expressions when beams are prestressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ANSYS is a software well accepted by professionals and academics, since it provides a variety of finite elements, material constitutive models, and linear and nonlinear analysis of structures in general. For the concrete material, for instance, the software uses an elastoplastic model with the Willam-Warnke surface of rupture (1975). However, this model is only available for finite elements that do not offer the possibility of use of the element-embedded model for rebars, demanding a much larger amount of elements to discretize structures, making numerical solutions less efficient. This study is, therefore, about the development of a computational model using the Finite Element Method via ANSYS platform for nonlinear analysis of reinforced and prestressed concrete beams under plane stress states. The most significant advantage of this implementation is the possibility of using the element-embedded rebar model in ANSYS with its 2D eight-node quadratic element PLANE183 for discretization of the concrete together with element REINF263 for discretization of rebars, stirrups, and cables, making the solutions faster and more efficient. For representation of the constitutive equations of the steel and the concrete, a proposed model was implemented with the help of the UPF customization tool (User Programmable Features) of ANSYS, where new subroutines written in FORTRAN were attached to the main program. The numerical results are compared with experimental values available in the technical literature to validate the proposed model, with satisfactory results being found. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents the recommendations on the concrete production for the precast prestressed reinforced concrete constructions (sleepers, etc.) with double turnover forms per day by using the integrated approach, involving the use of ordinary raw materials, effective modifiers of concrete structure, low-temperature of heat-steaming treatment. Such concretes should provide the required transfer strength (strength at the moment of release tension bars) in a relatively short time 10-12 hours. The implementation of the following measures requires for obtaining the high-performance concrete for sleepers in the conditions of the existing technological equipment of domestic plants: increasing the density of cement stone due to the use of water-reducing admixtures, improving the structure of concrete due to the use of low heat-steaming treatment, the account of activity of Portland cement at low temperature of heat-steaming treatment, use of active mineral component. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, a numerical procedure based on the finite element method for materially and. geometrically nonlinear analysis of reinforced and prestressed concrete slender columns with arbitrary section subjected to combined biaxial bending and axial load is developed. In order to overcome the low computer efficiency of the conventional section integration method in which the reinforced concrete section is divided into a large number of small areas, an efficient section integration method is used to determine the section tangent stiffness. In this method, the arbitrary shaped cross section is divided into several concrete trapezoids according to boundary vertices, and the contribution of each trapezoid to section stiffness is determined by integrating directly the trapezoid. The space frame flexural theory is utilized to derive the element tangent stiffness matrix. The nonlinear full-range member response is traced by an updated normal plane arc-length solution method. The analytical results agree well with the experimental ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Provides a chronological review of papers on the cost optimization of reinforced concrete, pre-stressed concrete and fiber-reinforced concrete structures, published in archival journals. Concrete beams and slabs; Concrete columns; Concrete frame structures; Other concrete structures; Cost optimization reliability theory.