Tensile behavior of ECC after exposing to high temperature.

High temperature is one of the worst conditions to engineered cementitious composite (ECC). In this paper, the tensile behaviors of PVA fiber reinforced ECC(PVA-ECC) and steel fiber+PVA fiber reinforced ECC (HyECC) at room temperature and after 200 °C, 400 °C, 600 °C elevated temperature exposure were studied. The results indicate that equally replacing PVA fibers by steel fibers degraded the tensile hardening ability of PVA-ECC at room temperature. The elevated temperature posed a significant effect on the tensile strength and toughness of PVA-ECC and HyECC. Tensile strain hardening behavior of the two types of ECCs was eliminated after high temperature exposure. Tensile strength and toughness of PVA-ECC presented an exponential decay along with the increase of temperature. The addition of steel fiber slowed down the decay rate of tensile strength and toughness of HyECC. Elevated temperature changed the microstructures of PVA-ECC and HyECC. The softening at 200 °C and decomposing at 400 °C of PVA fiber was the main reasons for the tensile behavior degradation of the two kinds of ECCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]