• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.745-757
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• 2018

The inclusion of a ductile steel bracing as means of repairing an earthquake-damaged bridge bent is evaluated and experimentally assessed for the purposes of restoring the damaged bent's strength and stiffness and further improving the energy dissipation capacity. The study is focused on substandard reinforced concrete multi-column bridge bents constructed in the 1950 to mid-1970 in the United States. These types of bents have numerous deficiencies making them susceptible to seismic damage. Large-scale experiments were used on a two-column reinforced concrete bent to impose considerable damage of the bent through increasing amplitude cyclic deformations. The damaged bent was then repaired by installing a ductile fuse steel brace in the form of a buckling-restrained brace in a diagonal configuration between the columns and using post-tensioned rods to strengthen the cap beam. The brace was secured to the bent using steel gusset plate brackets and post-installed adhesive anchors. The repaired bent was then subjected to increasing amplitude cyclic deformations to reassess the bent performance. A subassemblage test of a nominally identical steel brace was also conducted in an effort to quantify and isolate the ductile fuse behavior. The experimental data from these large-scale experiments were analyzed in terms of the hysteretic response, observed damage, internal member loads, as well as the overall stiffness and energy dissipation characteristics. The results of this study demonstrated the effectiveness of utilizing ductile steel bracing for restoring the bent and preventing further damage to the columns and cap beams while also improving the stiffness and energy dissipation characteristics.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.91-106
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• 2016

Two-dimensional elastoplastic finite element formulation is employed to investigate the load- carrying capacity degradation of reinforced concrete piers wrapped with steel plates due to occurrence of corrosion at the pier base. By comparing with experimental results, the employed finite element analysis method is verified to be accurate. After that, a series of parametric studies are conducted to investigate the effect of corrosion ratio and corrosion mode of steel plates located near the base of in-service pier P2 on load-carrying capacity of the piers. It is observed that the load-carrying capacity of the piers decreases with the increase in corrosion ratio of steel plates. There exists an obvious linear relationship between the load-carrying capacity and the corrosion ratio in the case of even corrosion mode. The degradation of load-carrying capacity resulted from the web's uneven corrosion mode is more serious than that under even corrosion mode, and the former case is more liable to occur than the latter case in actual engineering application. Finally, the failure modes of the piers under different corrosion state are discussed. It is found that the principal tensile strain of concrete and yield range of steel plates are distributed within a wide range in the case of slight corrosion, and they are concentrated on the column base when complete corrosion occurs. The findings obtained from the present study can provide a useful reference for the maintenance and strengthening of the in-service piers.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.50 no.6
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• pp.627-641
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• 2024

This paper presents an experimental and numerical study to investigate the behavior of the precast segmental concrete beams (PSCBs) utilizing high-strength concrete (HSC) connected in the zone of the maximum bending moment using steel extended endplate connections (EECs). The experimental study consisted of five beams as follows: The first beam was the control beam for comparison, which was an unconnected one-piece beam made of HSC. The other four other beams consisted of two identical pieces of precast concrete. An important point to be noted is that at the end of each piece, a steel plate was used with a thickness of 10 mm. Moreover, this steel plate was welded to the lower and upper reinforcing bars of the beam. Furthermore, the steel plate was made to connect the two pieces using the technique of EECs. Several variables were taken in these four beams, whether from the shape of the connection or enhancing the behavior of the connection using the post-tensioning technique. EECs without stiffeners were used for some of the tested beams. The behavior of these connections was improved using stiffeners and shear bolts. To get accurate results, a comparison was made between the behaviors of the five beams. Another important point to be noted is that Abaqus and SAP2000 programs were used to investigate the behavior of PSCBs and to ensure the accuracy of the modeling process which showed a good agreement with the experimental results. Additionally, the simplified modeling using SAP2000 was able to model the nonlinear behavior of PSCBs connected using steel EECs. It was found that the steel pre-tensioned bolted EECs, reinforced with steel stiffeners and shear anchors, could be used to connect the precast HSC segmental beams via the internal pre-stressing technique.

• Composites Research
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.69-75
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• 2018

In this study, a grid panel structure in which the woven CFRP composites were stacked in the orthogonal array was proposed and the mechanical properties were analyzed and studied. The grid parts were fabricated by cutting prepregs and laminating them. The grid panel structure was fabricated by co-curing with lower laminate plate in auto-clave process. The behavior of the proposed grid panel structure was evaluated by tests under tensile, compressive, shear, and bending loads. The effect of increasing the stiffness of the orthogonal grid structure was verified through these tests. In addition, the finite element model was constructed and compared with the test results, confirming the validity and reliability of the test and analysis.

• Composites Research
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.115-124
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• 2020

Laminate composites, especially Carbon fiber-reinforced composites are wide used in various industry such as aerospace and automotive industry due to their high specific strength and specific stiffness. However, the laminate composites has a big disadvantage that delamination occurs because the arrangement of the fibers is all arranged in the in-plane direction, which limits the field of application of the laminate composites. In this study, we first developed a laminate composites T-beam in which π-beam and flat plate were combined and optimized the design parameters through structural analysis and mechanical tests. Afterwards, 3D weave preform T-beam was developed by applying the same design parameters of laminate composites T-beams, and improved mechanical strength was achieved compared to laminated structures. These findings are expected to be applicable to existing laminated composite structures that require increased strength.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.15-21
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• 2018

Ships may collide with reefs or other objects during operation, when arriving or departing ports. The hull plate may be damaged due to the contact with other ships. The total number of domestic powered fishing vessels has decreased, but that of FRP fishing vessels has increased by 0.7% and the ratio of FRP fishing vessels to the total fishing vessels increased to 96%. Recently, fishing vessels has been used as fishing boats for income of non-fishermen as well as fishermen. Therefore, safety management for repair and maintenance is necessary. The penetration of moisture and moisture in the composite material such as FRP may deteriorate the mechanical properties and the salt (NaCl) component of the damaged portion may cause a relatively high deterioration in material strength. The gel coat painting is the final stage of repairs ans maintenance of FRP fishing vessels. The thickness criteria in the domestic and foreign gel coat is 0.3~0.762 mm. The joint specimens, which was immersed in seawater for 120 days, were compared with those without seawater immersion. As a result, the tensile strength was 83 ~ 121.8% and the flexural strength was 83 ~ 113% compared with the specimens without seawater immersion. According to the previous study the tensile strength decreased by more than 29% and the flexural strength decreased by more than 50% when the composite material was immersed in seawater for 1,083 hours without coating. As a result, it was found that the gel coat with 0.5 mm thickness is very effective in preventing the strength decrease of the composite material.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.26 no.3A
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• pp.457-464
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• 2006

Fiber-reinforced composite materials due to their high specific strength, high stiffness and light weight are becoming increasingly used in many engineering industry, especially in the aerospace, marin and civil, etc. In this paper, the buckling load and mode shapes of composite laminates with elliptical cross-section including transverse shear deformations are analyzed. For solving this problems, a versatile flat shell element has been developed by combining a membrane element with drilling degree-of-freedom and a plate bending element. Also, an improved shell element has been established by the combined use of the addition of enhanced assumed strain and the substitute shear strain fields. The combined influence of shell geometry and elliptical cross-sectional parameter, fiber angle, and lay-up on the buckling loads of elliptical cylinder is examined. The critical buckling loads and mode shapes analyzed here may serve as a benchmark for future investigations.

• Asia-pacific Journal of Multimedia Services Convergent with Art, Humanities, and Sociology
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• v.7 no.11
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• pp.925-932
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• 2017

In this study, the analysis of plate under torsion was carried out according to stacking angle at the unidirectional carbon fiber reinforced plastic(UD CFRP) among composite materials. In case of UD CFRP, the material property due to stacking angle becomes different. Also, the stacking angles were designated to 15°, 30°, 45°, 60°, 75° and 90° at the study models. The notch hole was applied at the center part by supposing that rivet or hole was used. The analysis method was used by applying the experimental method at ISO 15310. Two jigs were fixed at the lower part and two jigs were descending at the upper part. As seen by the analysis result values at this study, the shear stress happening at the fracture part was seen with the lowest value in case of the stacking angle of 45°. It is known that the case of the stacking angle of 45°has the structural safety and durability higher than those of the other stacking angles when the torsion applies. It is thought that this result can be applied to the data of basis which can be devoted to the durability when the torsion is applied at CFRP plate.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.13 no.1 s.53
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• pp.195-204
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• 2009

Application of steel plates is one of widely used methods for shear strengthening of reinforced concrete beams that are insufficient of shear capacity. While the existing method applying solid steel plates provides good shear rigidity, however, it is concerned by brittle bond failure patterns, inefficient material usage, and low constructability. The use of strap type steel plates has also shortcomings of low strenthening effect due to small interface bonding area and ununified behavior between plates and main body. Therefore, this study aims to introduce the shear strengthening method using slit type steel plate, which can solve out the problems aforementioned, and to verify its strengthening effects on shear capacity. A total of 13 specimens strengthened by slit type steel plates were fabricated with primary test parameters of plate width, slit spacing, and plate thickness. The test results from this study were also compared to those from the existing research on RC beams strengthened by strap type steel plates, and the strengthening effects on shear capacity of specimens having bonded slit type steel plates were quantitatively analyzed. The test results showed that the RC beams strengthened by slit type steel plates had greater shear capacities than those with strap type steel plates, which is considered to be the effects of improved composite behavior and larger interface bonding area in the RC beams strengthened by the slit type steel plates.

• Composites Research
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.88-93
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• 2018

In this study, damaged composite laminates were repaired by a stepped patch repair method using halloysite nanotube(HNT) and milled carbon(MC) reinforced composite materials with different amount of the particles. And the mechanical and structural effects of the particles on the interface between the damaged and repair surfaces were analyzed. At this time, after exposing them to a harsh environment of high temperature and humidity for a long time, the recovery rate of the material properties relative to the material forming the damaged plate was compared. As a result, at $70^{\circ}C$ high temperature distilled water, the hygroscopicity of the HNT/GFRP composites was significantly different from that of the MC/GFRP composites. Especially, 0.5, 1 wt. % HNT was added, the moisture absorption rate was the lowest and this was the factor that contributed to the mechanical strength increase. On the other hand, MC showed a high hygroscopic resistance only with a small amount, and the strength was different according to the action direction of the load, and the addition amount was also different.