Responses of Plain and Steel Fiber-Reinforced Concrete Beams to Temperature and Mechanical Loads: Experimental Study

To study the structural responses of plain and steel fiber-reinforced concrete pavements under combined mechanical and thermal loads, two test series have been conducted with plain and steel fiber-reinforced concrete beams. The magnitude and duration of the differences in the induced stresses caused by traffic load and a positive nonlinear temperature gradient (the top surface was warmer than the bottom surface during the day) may lead to some relaxation of thermal stresses and subsequently increase the load-carrying capacity. Considering the loss of support contact in the interior part of the concrete pavement, the experimental study of combined loading with restrained concrete beams may provide some insight and an indication of whether the superposition of stresses is a proper approach. The beams were subjected to solely thermal, solely mechanical, and combined thermal and mechanical loads while the rotation of the beam at supports was prevented. The results of tests conducted with both plain and steel fiber-reinforced beams showed that the superposition of stresses under combined loading before cracking gave a satisfactory estimation of the load-carrying capacities. The results also showed that the effect of relaxation of stresses due to short-term thermal loads was not noticeable in the load-carrying capacity achieved in tests with combined thermal and mechanical loads. On the contrary, a tendency for reduction of the load-carrying capacity was observed at higher thermal gradients. In addition, the overall structural responses of steel fiber-reinforced concrete beams under mechanical load and a nonlinear temperature gradient combined were similar to the responses of plain concrete beams up to the cracking stage. However, the release of thermal stresses due to cracking and the considerable residual load-carrying capacity after cracking were the most important observations for steel fiber-reinforced concrete beams.