• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.605-621
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• 2013

CFRP strips are widely used nowadays for repair/strengthening or capacity increase purposes. Sharp bending at the ends of the CFRP strips is frequently encountered at these applications. In this study, Reinforced Concrete (RC) beam specimens that were produced with 10 MPa compression strength concrete were strengthened by using bonded CFRP strips with end anchorages to tension region. The parameters that were investigated in this study are the width of the strip, the number of applied fan anchorages and whether additional layer of CFRP patch is used or not at the strip ends. Specimens were strengthened with 100 mm wide CFRP strips with one or two anchorages at the ends. In addition CFRP patch with two and three anchorages at the ends were tested for investigating the effect of the patches. Specimens that were strengthened with three anchorages at the ends with patches were repeated with 60 and 80 mm wide CFRP strips. The most successful result was obtained from the specimen that was strengthened with 80 mm wide CFRP strips with 3 end anchorages and patches among the others at the experimental program. The numbers of anchorages that were applied to ends of CFRP strips were more effective than the width of the CFRP strips onto strength and stiffness of the specimens. Due to limited space at the ends of the strips at most three anchorages could be applied.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.557-580
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• 2003

Laminated composite structures find wide range of applications in many branches of technology. They are much suited for weight sensitive structures (like aircraft) where thinner and lighter members made of advanced fiber reinforced composite materials are used. The orientations of fiber direction in layers and number of layers and the thickness of the layers as well as material of composites play a major role in determining the strength and stiffness. Thus the basic design problem is to determine the optimum stacking sequence in terms of laminate thickness, material and fiber orientation. In this paper, a new optimization technique called Cellular Automata (CA) has been combined with Genetic Algorithm (GA) to develop a different search and optimization algorithm, known as Cellular Genetic Algorithm (CGA), which considers the laminate thickness, angle of fiber orientation and the fiber material as discrete variables. This CGA has been successfully applied to obtain the optimal fiber orientation, thickness and material lay-up for multi-layered composite hybrid beams plates and shells subjected to static buckling and dynamic constraints.

• Composites Research
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.39-46
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• 2001

Experimental studies on the adaptive multi-mode vibration control of composite beams have been performed using neuro-controller. Neuro-controllers require too much computational burden, which blocks wide real-time applications of neuro-controllers. Therefore, in this paper, an adaptive notch filter is proposed to separate a vibration signal into each modal vibration signal. Two neuro-controllers with fewer weights are connected to the corresponding modal signals to generate proper modal control forces. The vibration controls using the adaptive notch filter and neuro-controllers have been performed for two specimens. A and B, which have different natural frequencies because of different positions of tip masses. Significant vibration reduction has been observed in both cases. The vibration control results show that the present neuro-controller has good adaptiveness under the system parameter variations.

• International Journal of Concrete Structures and Materials
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.71-78
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• 2013

Prestressed concrete (PC) is the predominant material in highway bridge construction. The use of high-strength concrete has gained wide acceptance in the PC industry. The main target in the highway industry is to increase the durability and the life-span of bridges. Cracking of elements is one aspect which affects durability. Recently, nine 7.62 meter long PC I-beams made with different concrete strength were designed according to a simple, semi-empirical equation developed at the University of Houston (UH) (Laskar et al., ACI Journal 107(3): 330-339, 2010). The UH Method is a function of shear span-to-depth ratio (a/d), concrete strength $\sqrt{f^{\prime}_c}$, web area $b_wd$, and amount of transverse steel. Based on testing these girders, the shear cracking strength of girders with different concrete strength and different shear span-to-depth ratio was investigated and compared to the available approaches in current codes such as ACI 318-11 (2011) and AASHTO LRFD Specifications (2010).

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.45-67
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• 2010

Composite steel-concrete structures are employed extensively in modern high rise buildings and bridges. This concept has achieved wide spread acceptance because it guarantees economic benefits attributable to reduced construction time and large improvements in stiffness. Even though the combination of steel and concrete enhances the strength and stiffness of composite beams, the time-dependent behaviour of concrete may weaken the strength of the shear connection. When the concrete loses its strength, it will transfer its stresses to the structural steel through the shear studs. This behaviour will reduce the strength of the composite member. This paper presents the development of an accurate finite element model using ABAQUS to study the behaviour of shear connectors in push tests incorporating the time-dependent behaviour of concrete. The structure is modelled using three-dimensional solid elements for the structural steel beam, shear connectors, concrete slab and profiled steel sheeting. Adequate care is taken in the modelling of the concrete behaviour when creep is taken into account owing to the change in the elastic modulus with respect to time. The finite element analyses indicated that the slip ductility, the strength and the stiffness of the composite member were all reduced with respect to time. The results of this paper will prove useful in the modelling of the overall composite beam behaviour. Further experiments to validate the models presented herein will be conducted and reported at a later stage.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.357-364
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• 2002

The study performed a series of flexural tests on Closed Cold-Formed Steel Sections for stud, joist, and roof truss. Results were compared with analytical values. Each 2.4-m long and 0.9-m wide specimen consisted of two steel beams set at 0.46 m interval. The steel beams were attached to the specimens using either plaster board or ply wood. Another specimens did not use any attachment material. Positive and negative bending tests were conducted to investigate the composite behavior, including the effects of plaster board or ply wood on the buckling behavior of steel beam. Full-scale roof truss tests were also performed to study the buckling behavior and failure mode of the truss members.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.76 no.1
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• pp.67-81
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• 2020

Pretensioned concrete (PC) is widely used in contemporary construction. Bond of prestressing strand is significant for composite-action between the strand and concrete in the transfer and flexural-bond zones of PC members. This study develops a new methodology for quantifying the bond of 18-mm prestressing strand in PC members based on results of a pullout test, the Standard Test for Strand Bond (STSB). The experimental program includes: (a) twenty-four pretensioned concrete beams, using a wide range of concrete compressive strength; and (b) twelve untensioned pullout specimens. By testing beams, the transfer length, flexural-bond length, and development length were all measured. In the STSB, the pullout forces for the strands were measured. Experimental results indicate a significant relationship between the bond of prestressing strand to the code-established design parameters, such as transfer length and development length. However, the code-predictions can be unconservative for the prestressing strands having a low STSB pullout force. Three simplified bond equations are proposed for the design applications of PC members.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.1929-1943
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• 2021

Millimeter wave (mmWave) communication based on the wide bandwidth of >28 GHz is one of the key technologies for cellular-connected unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The selection of mmWave beams in such cellular-connected UAVs is challenging and critical, especially when downlink transmissions toward aerial user equipment (UE) suffer from poor signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) more often than their terrestrial counterparts. This study proposed a coordinated mmWave beam selection scheme using fingerprint for cellular-connected UAV. The scheme comprises fingerprint database configuration and coordinated beam selection. In the fingerprint database configuration, the best beam index from the serving cell and interference beam indexes from neighboring cells are stored. In the coordinated beam selection, the best and interference beams are determined using the fingerprint database information instead of performing an exhaustive search, and the coordinated beam transmission improves the SINR for aerial UEs. System-level simulations assess the UAV effect based on the third-generation partnership project-new radio mmWave and UAV channel models. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme can reduce the overhead of exhaustive search and improve the SINR and spectral efficiency.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.88 no.5
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• pp.501-519
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• 2023

This paper introduces a new hybrid structural connection joint that combines shear walls with section steel beams, fundamentally resolving the construction complexity issue of requiring pre-embedded connectors in the connection between shear walls and steel beams. Initially, a quasi-static loading scheme with load-deformation dual control was employed to conduct low-cycle repeated loading experiments on five new connection joints. Data was acquired using displacement and strain gauges to compare the energy dissipation coefficients of each specimen. The destruction process of the new connection joints was meticulously observed and recorded, delineating it into three stages. Hysteresis curves and skeleton curves of the joint specimens were plotted based on experimental results, summarizing the energy dissipation performance of the joints. It's noteworthy that the addition of shear walls led to an approximate 17% increase in the energy dissipation coefficient. The energy dissipation coefficients of dog-bone-shaped connection joints with shear walls and cover plates reached 2.043 and 2.059, respectively, exhibiting the most comprehensive hysteresis curves. Additionally, the impact of laminated steel plates covering composite concrete floors on the stiffness of semi-rigid joint ends under excessive stretching should not be disregarded. A comparison with finite element analysis results yielded an error of merely 2.2%, offering substantial evidence for the wide-ranging application prospects of this innovative joint in seismic performance.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.125-137
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• 2024

Composite laminates are used in a wide range of applications including defense, automotive, aviation and aerospace, marine, wind energy, and recreational sporting goods. These composite beams still exhibit problems such as buckling, local deformations, and interlaminar delamination. To overcome these drawbacks, a novel viscoelastic autoclave bonding with tapered epoxy reinforcement polyurethane films is proposed. In existing laminates, compression face wrinkling and interlaminar delamination is caused in the sandwich beam. The unique viscoelastic autoclave spunbond interlayer bonding is designed to prevent face wrinkling and absorb and distribute stresses induced by external loads, thereby eliminating interlaminar delamination in the sandwich beam. Also, the existing special reinforcement causes stress concentrations, and the core is not effectively connected, which directly affects the stiffness of the beam. To address this, a novel tapered epoxy polyurethane reinforcement adhesive film is proposed, whose reinforcement thickness gradually tapers as it enters the core material. This minimizes stress concentrations at the interface, preventing excessive adhesive squeeze-out during the bonding process, and improves the stiffness of the beam. Results indicate the proposed model avoids the formation of micro cracks, interlaminar delamination, buckling, and local deformations, and effectively improves the stiffness of the beam.