Uniaxial tension test for steel fibre reinforced concrete -: a parametric study

A RILEM Draft Recommendation was proposed in 2001 for obtaining the stress versus crack opening (sigma-w) response of steel fibre reinforced concrete through a uniaxial tension test. The present study analyses the robustness of the recommended test through a parametric study. Furthermore, the methodology is extrapolated to cores extracted from cast elements. Also, the effect of the coring direction with respect to the preferential fibre orientation caused by the compaction procedure is examined. The study demonstrates that the test is robust and representative of the material response, and could be used for determining the sigma-w relation of the material that may be needed for comparing the performance of different fibres or for providing input for finite element analysis. No significant influence of the characteristics of the specimen or problems of instability due to the loss of control were encountered. There is some relative rotation between the crack faces but its influence on the sigma-w response is expected to be negligible. The parameters obtained from the tests exhibit coefficients of variation of up to 30%, which is mainly attributed to the randomness of the number of fibres bridging the crack, considering the relatively small cross-section of the specimen. (C) 2002 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.