Displacement-recovery-capacity of superelastic SMA fibers reinforced cementitious materials

This study investigated the effects of the geometric parameters of superelastic shape memory alloy (SE SMA) fibers on the pullout displacement recovering and self-healing capacity of reinforced cementitious composites. Three diameters of 0.5, 0.7 and 1.0 mm and two different crimped lengths of 5.0 and 10.0 mm were considered. To provide best anchoring action and high bond between fiber and cement mortar, the fibers were crimped at the end to create spear-head shape. The single fiber cement-based specimens were manufactured with the cement mortar of a compressive strength of 84 MPa with the square shape at the top and a dog-bone shape at the bottom. The embedded length of each fiber was 15 mm. The pullout test was performed with displacement control to obtain monotonic or hysteretic behaviors. The results showed that pullout displacements were recovered after fibers slipped and stuck in the specimen. The specimens with fiber of larger diameter showed better displacement recovering capacity. The flag-shaped behavior was observed for all specimens, and those with fiber of 1.0 mm diameter showed the clearest one. It was observed that the length of fiber anchorage did not have a significant effect on the displacement recovery, pullout resistance and self-healing capacity.