Post-Cracking Properties of Concrete Reinforced with Polypropylene Fibers through the Barcelona Test

Abstract

The Barcelona method was developed as an alternative to other tests for assessing the post-cracking behavior of fiber-reinforced concrete, with the main advantage being that it uses significantly smaller specimens compared to other methods. For this reason, it can provide a solution for characterizing concrete in hard-to-reach constructions such as roads and tunnels. On the other hand, polypropylene (PP) fibers have gained increased attention in recent years within the scientific community due to their high tensile strength and cost-effectiveness. This research aimed to understand the influence of PP fiber volume, slenderness (l/d), and reinforcement index on post-cracking properties of concrete, including toughness and residual strength (f_res ), using the Barcelona method. Three fiber volumes, 0.4%, 0.8%, and 1.2%, and three slenderness ratios, 46.5, 58.1, and 69.8, were employed in normal-strength concrete. In addition to the reference mixture without fibers, 10 mixtures were prepared with 10 specimens each, resulting in a total of 100 specimens. Pearson’s hypothesis test was employed to determine the existence of correlations between variables, followed by scatter plots to generate predictive equations between post-cracking properties and fiber attributes. The results indicated no direct correlation between fiber slenderness and post-cracking properties. Regarding fiber volume, there was a correlation with residual strength but not with toughness. However, the combined effect of volume and slenderness, the reinforcement index, correlates with the post-cracking properties of concrete. Finally, four predictive equations for toughness and residual strength were derived based on the reinforcement index. These equations can prove valuable for designing structures made of polypropylene fiber-reinforced concrete.