Quality control of fiber reinforced concretes by mean of double punshing test (barcelona test)

Abstract

Traditionally, flexural testing of prismatic beams is used to characterize the strength and behavior in post – cracking regime of fiber – reinforced concretes (FRC). These tests exhibit a high dispersion in their results, and therefore invalidate the use of such tests for the systematic control of  FRCs works. Also, they have the disadvantage of being complex tests, which require heavy specimens and highly qualified staff . The use of other standard tests of direct and indirect tensile strength has also been intended, which have proved very complex to implement and also have high dispersion. Aiming to solve this set of problems, an indirect tensile test based on the configuration of double punching test, called the Barcelona test, has been proposed to control tensile behavior of FRC. This test requires smaller specimens, with a high specific surface of fracture, allowing to obtain values representative of strength and toughness of materials, with considerably less dispersion than other experimental methodologies. This paper presents the results of different experimental campaigns, which validate the use of Barcelona test as a suitable methodology to systematic characterization FRC in works.