Concrete confinement with steel-reinforced grout jackets

The potential of steel fiber reinforced jackets combined with inorganic matrix (cementitious grout matrix) as an alternative strengthening system to fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) jackets was investigated experimentally in the current study. For this purpose, the novel jacketing device was applied on cylindrical specimens subjected to monotonic concentric uniaxial compression load. Parameters of investigation were the type of the steel fiber reinforced fabric, its density, the overlap length, and the concrete compressive strength. The 3 x 2 and 12x types of steel fabric were used with three alternative densities, characterized as high, medium and low density. Experimental evidence has shown that a single layer of SRG jacket has increased substantially both axial strength and deformation capacity. From the response of the SRG confined cylinders the degree of penetration of the grout matrix through the fabric as well as the overlap length are considered rather critical parameters for the effectiveness of the method. The experimental data were used for the derivation of a simple empirical confinement model which correlated well with other well-established FRP confinement models. The knowledge gained from this experimental study renders SRG jacketing a remarkably promising retrofit solution for reinforced concrete confinement.