Failure behaviour investigation of continuous yarn reinforced cementitious composites

In order to better understand the failure mechanism of continuous yarn reinforced cementitious composites, the interaction between yarn and matrix is studied in this work by means of pull-out behaviour analysis. Analytical, numerical and experimental investigation is carried out in order to provide a thorough understanding of the failure mechanisms. This work consists of three parts: In the first part, the pull-out behaviour of a yarn/matrix system is analyzed by an analytical model based on fracture mechanics concept. The shear failure at the interface between yarn and matrix is considered as the creation of a tunnel crack at the interface between yarn and matrix. The second part is concerned with the numerical modelling. The pull-out test is simulated by Finite Element Method. The numerical results are compared with the analytical results. The last part contributes to experimental study. The experimental results are compared with both the analytical results and numerical results. It has been shown that the numerical and experimental results are in good agreement with those obtained according to analytical model. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.