• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.361-372
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• 2019

Tubular joints are used in the construction of offshore structures and other land-based structures because of its ease of fabrication. These joints are subjected to different environmental loadings in their lifetime. At the time of fabrication or modification of an existing offshore platform, tubular joints are usually strengthened to withstand the environmental loads. Currently, various strengthening techniques such as ring stiffeners, gusset plates are employed to strengthen new and existing tubular joints. Due to some limitations with the present practices, some new techniques need to be addressed. Many researchers used Fibre Reinforced Polymer (FRP) to strengthen tubular joints. Some of the studies were focused on axial compression of Glass Fibre Reinforced Polymer (GFRP) strengthened tubular joints and found that it was an efficient technique. Earlier, the authors had performed studies on Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) strengthened tubular joint subjected to axial compression. The study steered to the conclusion that FRP composites is an alternative strengthening technique for tubular joints. In this work, the study was focused on axial compression of Y-joint and in plane and out of plane bending of T-joints. Experimental investigations were performed on these joints, fabricated from ASTM A106 Gr. B steel. Two sets of joints were fabricated for testing, one is a reference joint and the other is a joint strengthened with CFRP. After performing the set of experiments, test results were then compared with the numerical solution in ANSYS Parametric Design Language (APDL). It was observed that the joints strengthened with CFRP were having improved strength, lesser surface displacement and ovalization when compared to the reference joint.

• Composites Research
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.13-19
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• 2009

Adhesive joints are widely used for structural joining applications in various fields and environmental conditions. Polyurethane adhesive is using for LNG carrier with cryogenic temperature condition. Even if similar polyurethane adhesive is used for different substrate, it shows different adhesion properties. Specially, variation of adhesion properties depending on the resin system or fiber is very important factor for selection of adhesive on industrial application. In present study, we got different peel strength according to the different test temperature when different polyurethane adhesive was used for same fiber reinforced composite. The main cause was investigated using by SEM and it was proven that the different adhesion property between glass fiber on composite surface and polyurethane adhesives at cryogenic temperature.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.121-130
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• 2007

To investigate the enhancement in strength and deformation capacities of concrete confined by FRP composites, tests under axial loads were carried out on three groups of thirty six short columns in circular section with diverse GFRP confining reinforcement. The major test variables considered include fiber content or orientation, wrap or tube type by varying the end loading condition, and continuous or discontinuous confinement depending on the presence of vortical spices between its two halves. The circumferential FRP strains at failure for different types of confinements were also investigated with emphasis. Various analytical models capable of predicting the ultimate strength and strain of the confined concrete were examined by comparing to observed results. Tests results showed that FRP wraps or tubes provide the substantial increase in strength and deformation, while partial wraps comprising the vertical discontinuities fail in an explosive manner with less increase in strength, particularly in deformation. A bilinear stress-strain response was observed throughout all tests with some variations of strain hardening. The failure hoop strains measured on the FRP surface were less than those obtained from the tensile coupons in all tests with a high degree of variation. In overall, existing predictive equations overestimated ultimate strengths and strains observed in present tests, with a much larger scatter related to the latter. For more accuracy, two simple design- oriented equations correlated with present tests are proposed. The strength equation was derived using the Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion, whereas the strain equation was based on entirely fitting of test data including the unconfined concrete strength as one of governing factors.

• Composites Research
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.10-16
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• 2011

Many tests are required to predict the fatigue life of composite laminates made of various materials and having different layup sequences. Aiming at reducing the number of tests, a methodology was presented in this paper to predict fatigue life of composite laminates based on fatigue life prediction of constituents, i.e. the fiber, matrix and interface, using micromechanics of failure. For matrix, the equivalent stress model which is generally used for isotropic materials was employed to take care of multi-axial fatigue loading. For fiber, a maximum stress model considering only stress along fiber direction was used. The critical plane model was introduced for the interface of the fiber and matrix, but fatigue life prediction was ignored for the interface since the interface fatigue strength was presumed high enough. The modified Goodman equation was utilized to take into account the mean stress effect. To check the validity of the theory, the fatigue life of three different GFRP laminates, UDT[$90^{\circ}2$], BX[${\pm}45^{\circ}$]S and TX[$0^{\circ}/{\pm}45^{\circ}$]S was examined experimentally. The comparison between predictions and test measurements showed good agreement.