Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

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Construction and Building Materials

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

Cyclic tensile behavior of SFRC: Experimental research and analytical

model
Biao Li, Yin Chi ⇑, Lihua Xu ⇑, Changning Li, Yuchun Shi
School of Civil Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China

h i g h l i g h t s

The effect of steel fiber on the cyclic tensile stress-strain behavior of concrete was investigated.

The unloading elastic stiffness of SFRC was only determined by the envelope stress.

The damage progression and failure mechanism of SFRC were studied based on AE response.

A damage elastoplastic constitutive model for SFRC was developed.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper presents an experimental investigation on the stress-strain behavior of steel fiber reinforced
Received 5 June 2018 concrete (SFRC) subjected to uniaxial monotonic and cyclic tension. A total of 42 samples are fabricated
Received in revised form 14 September and tested for various fiber volume fractions and aspect ratios. The entire cyclic tensile stress-strain
2018
curves are captured and the acoustic emission (AE) signals are synchronously recorded during the tensile
Accepted 20 September 2018
testing. The damage progression and failure mechanism of SFRC are studied using AE characteristic
parameters. The results show that the inclusion of steel fiber significantly improves the cyclic mechanical
properties of concrete with respect to peak stress, peak strain, residual strength, toughness and post-peak
Keywords:
Steel fiber reinforced concrete (SFRC)
ductility, which increase drastically with increasing fiber parameters. Moreover, the elastic stiffness is
Tension observed to degrade with increasing loading cycles and the degradation rate is remarkably alleviated
Monotonic/cyclic loading as the fiber volume fraction or aspect ratio increases. However, it is noted that the steel fiber has no sig-
Stress-strain behavior nificant contributions on the plastic strain accumulation, meaning that the unloading elastic stiffness of
Acoustic emission (AE) SFRC is only determined by the envelope stress. In addition, based on AE results, a rapid damage evolu-
Damage mechanism tion is observed at the formation of the first crack, with the occurrence of a stress drop and a release of
Constitutive model concentrated AE signals. The total amount of AE activity and shear cracks in concrete increase with an
increase in fiber parameters for both monotonic and cyclic loading protocols. The determinant of concrete
failure mode changes from tensile cracks to shear cracks with increasing fiber volume fraction. Finally, a
damage elastoplastic constitutive model is developed with the effect of steel fiber taken into considera-
tion, and the prediction shows a close estimation of the monotonic and cyclic stress-strain responses.
Ó 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Over decades, steel fiber reinforced concrete (SFRC) has been
widely used in the field of civil engineering. The inclusion of steel
Abbreviations: FRC, Fiber reinforced concrete; SFRC, Steel fiber reinforced
concrete; UHPFRC, Ultra-high performance fiber reinforced concrete; SHCC,
Strain-hardening cement-based composites; NDT, Non-destructive testing; AE,
Acoustic emission; RT, Rise time; DT, Duration time; A, Amplitude; AF, Average
frequency; RA, Rise angle; PLB, Pencil lead break; WPS, Wave propagation speed; RI,
Fiber reinforcing index.
⇑ Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: yin.chi@whu.edu.cn (Y. Chi), xulihua@whu.edu.cn (L. Xu).
fiber into the concrete matrix is known to significantly enhance the
tensile strength, deformation capacity and post-cracking ductility
of concrete materials [1–4], and consequently improve the overall
performance of the members and structures [5–7]. It is acknowl-
edged that the reliable design and seismic retrofit of SFRC struc-
tures against external complex actions, such as earthquake,
fatigue, explosion, and other types of loads, necessitate a clear
understanding of the mechanical behavior of SFRC under mono-
tonic and cyclic loadings. Meanwhile, experimental observations
[8–10] have substantiated that the failure of concrete members
and structures is eventually determined by the damage accumula-
tion degree of SFRC at the material scale during the loading

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2018.09.140
0950-0618/Ó 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250
process. As a result, the cyclic stress-strain relation and the damage
evolution law of SFRC materials are the key aspects in uncovering
the realistic failure process as well as probing the variation of the
structural responses of SFRC structures.
To date, substantial efforts have been done on stress-strain rela-
tions of plain concrete, confined concrete, as well as fiber rein-
forced concrete (FRC) under uniaxial monotonic and cyclic
compression [11–20]. Based on the test results, available damage
evolution laws and constitutive models for concrete are estab-
lished [21–25]. Meanwhile, using the concepts of fracture energy,
plastic and damage mechanics, many theoretical constitutive mod-
els are developed for concrete [26–30]. In comparison with studies
for compressive loading case, limited research is concentrated on
the behavior of concrete under direct monotonic and cyclic tension
due to a series of challenges and difficulties faced in the tensile
testing. Yankelevsky and Reinhardt [31,32] carried out a pioneer
investigation on the cyclic tensile behavior of plain concrete, and
proposed corresponding mathematical expressions to predict the
cyclic responses. Shang et al. [33] also conducted an experimental
research on the complete stress-strain curves of concrete under
low-frequency cyclic load, and concluded that the envelope curves
under cyclic tension are approximately the same as the monotonic
curves. Lin et al. [34] reported the responses of concrete subjected
to dynamic elevated-amplitude cyclic tension, and presented a for-
mula to predict the strength enhancement of concrete. Further-
more, for the past few years, many efforts have been devoted to
investigating the hysteretic behavior of plain concrete under cyclic
tension for various loading regimes and strain rates [35–38]. Based
on the test results, analytical formulae introducing the damage
index were developed to model the monotonic stress-strain curve
and hysteretic loop as well as energy consumption of concrete.
With respect to FRC materials, to fulfill the rapid development
and construction of infrastructure system, there has been a consid-
erable amount of research works sorely concerned on developing
high-strength and high-performance fiber reinforced cementitious
material. For example, Paschalis and Lampropoulos [39] proposed
an ultra-high performance fiber reinforced concrete (UHPFRC),
and developed a semi-empirical constitutive model for monotonic
and cyclic tensile behaviors. Jun and Mechtcherine [40,41] investi-
gated the behavior of strain-hardening cement-based composites
(SHCC) subjected to monotonic and cyclic tension, and established
a multi-scale approach based model, just name a few. These
research outcomes have achieved a great success in predicting
(a) Rise time, RT Low average frequency, AF
& high RA value
Aamplitude, A
Rise angle, RA
Treshhold
Shear Mode
Duration
High average frequency, AF
& low RA value
RA
A
Treshhold
Tensile Mode
Fig. 1. (a) Parameters’ definition with AE hits and counts. (b) Typical crack classification.
1237
the capacity of FRC structure during service. However, from the
above literature review, it can be summarized that although many
attempts have been made to capture the cyclic/hysteretic stress-
strain behaviors of plain concrete and FRC, there are little consid-
erations or no excursions into the tensile stress regimes, which
in fact play an important role in accurate estimation of structural
performance following the computational simulation approach.
The broad experimental studies on the cyclic tensile stress-strain
behavior of SFRC have still been limited. In the meantime, much
less attention has also been directed towards the modeling of
FRC under cyclic tension. Among the limited publications, the
mathematical formulations as well as the tensile damage evolution
law reported is mainly derived by the monotonic stress-strain
response based on simple assumptions, where the damage model
parameters are lack of physical interpretation, the intrinsic damage
mechanism of SFRC is still unknown, which is insufficient to guide
the design of SFRC members and structures.
With the development in non-destructive testing (NDT) tech-
nology, acoustic emission (AE) technique has been one of the use-
ful methods for the investigation of local damage in damage
monitoring, recognition and evaluation of concrete materials and
structures, with showing particular advantages [42–48]. The AE
signals induced by elastic waves are emitted by micro-cracks’ for-
mation and propagation in concrete. The usually used AE parame-
ters are AE hits, events, counts, rise time (RT), duration time (DT),
amplitude (A), average frequency (AF), and rise angle (RA) value
etc.. Moreover, the failure of concrete is determined by two kinds
of cracks, i.e. tensile crack and shear crack. Each type of a crack
has distinct AE signal characteristics [46–48], as illustrated in
Fig. 1a. The AE parameters such as AF and RA value can be used
to classify the failure mode in concrete, as shown in Fig. 1b. In
recent years, extensive studies on the AE response of SFRC materi-
als and structures under bending, compression, shear, seismic etc.,
have been conducted [46–50], however the damage in SFRC during
the whole loading process under tension, which is of critical impor-
tance for a clear understanding of the mechanical behavior of SFRC,
has not been investigated yet.
The objective of the present work is to investigate the cyclic
tensile behavior and reveal the underlying damage mechanism of
SFRC. Forty two cylindrical specimens were tested under mono-
tonic and cyclic tension, with synchronized recording of the AE sig-
nals emitted from the concrete. The influential factors in terms of
fiber volume fraction and aspect ratio on both the monotonic
(b)
Tensile cracks
Average frequency
Treshhold crossings
(counts)
RA=RT/A
AF=Counts/Duration
Shear cracks
RA value
1238 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

and cyclic tensile responses of SFRC were studied. Moreover, the
damage progression of SFRC in terms of elastic stiffness degrada-
tion and AE signal emitting process was investigated. Furthermore,
the damage mechanism of SFRC was uncovered using RA value and
AF of AE signals, as well as AE source location results at the meso-
scale. Analytical formulae for the damage evolution laws of SFRC
with the fineness modulus of 2.6 were used for fine aggregates. The grading curves
of them are plotted in Fig. 2. A high effective water reducer with a water-reducing
efficiency being greater than 20% was adopted.
Hooked-end steel fibers were employed in this study. The major properties of
them are given in Table 3. Four fiber volume fractions of 0.5%, 1.0%, 1.5% and
2.0%, three fiber aspect ratios of 40, 60 and 80 were respectively selected as the
main variables. The details of specimens are listed in Table 4.

were established according to the elastic stiffness degradation pro-

cess. Finally, an empirical damage elasto-plastic constitutive model
was developed to generalize the monotonic and cyclic tensile
stress-strain responses of SFRC, which was then validated by the
test results. The present research work should be of critical signif-
icance in understanding the stress-strain and damage behaviors of
SFRC at the macro- and meso-scales.
2. Experimental program
2.1. Materials and mix proportions
2.2. Specimens preparation
For each concrete mixture, six cylindrical specimens with a diameter of 75 mm
and a length of 200 mm were employed for monotonic and cyclic tensile tests.
Meanwhile, six cubes with side lengths of 150 mm were cast to test the compres-
sive and splitting tensile strengths of concrete in accordance with the Chinese Stan-
dard JGJ 55-2011 [49].
A forced mixer was used for the concrete mixing. Once the mixing process com-
pleted, the fresh concrete was immediately cast into the prepared plastic molds,
and then vibrated for 3–5 min upon a vibrating table. After 24 h, the specimens
were demoulded and stored in a standard curing room with a constant temperature
of 20 °C and humidity of 95% for 28 days.

The mix proportions of plain concrete designed according to the Chinese Stan- 2.3. Test setup
dard JGJ 55-2011 [49] are shown in Table 1. Portland cement (P.O 42.5) was used.
The mineral compositions of the cement are summarized in Table 2. Crushed gravel The uniaxial tension test was conducted on a universal electro-hydraulic servo
stones of sizes of 5–20 mm were selected as the coarse aggregates and river sands rock mechanics test machine-MTS 815, with a load capacity of 10000kN, as shown
in Fig. 3. During the loading process, two extensometers (1#, 2#) were used to mea-
sure the vertical strain of specimens in order to eliminate the random error induced
Table 1 by possible bending of the specimens. The gauge length of them is 100 mm, and the
Designed concrete mix proportions. precision is 0.001 mm. The displacements and axial loads were automatically
recorded in a computer. In this loading system, in order to avoid the loading eccen-
W/B Unit weight (kg/m3) tricity, the steel link chine and spherical hinge were designed. Moreover, the both
Water Cement Sand Gravel Superplasticizer ends of the specimen were stuck to the steel plates by using a construction structural
adhesive. Furthermore, in an attempt to avoid the debonding between steel plates
0.42 175 417 724 1086 4.2 and concrete specimens, steel lantern rings with an internal diameter of 77 mm
and a height of 25 mm were used. The internal side faces of them were mounted
to the bottom and top of the specimens in order to increase the lateral shear strength
Table 2 along with the loading direction of specimens, and the bottom was connected to the
The mineral composition of the cement, in mass percent (%). steel plates. The test set-up and instruments are shown in Fig. 3.
In order to capture the emitted signals and monitor the crack propagation pro-
CaO SiO2 Al2O3 Fe2O3 MgO SO3 K2O Na2O Loss on ignition cess of concrete, four AE sensors formed into a three-dimensional space were
62.9 20.7 4.84 3.18 2.15 3.56 0.85 0.15 1.22 attached to the surfaces of specimens, as shown in Fig. 3. Specifically, two sensors
(#1, #2) were symmetrically distributed at one of the vertical axis, and #3, #4 sen-
sors were also symmetrically coated at another vertical axis of the specimen. Each
sensor was deviated 60 mm from the middle height of the specimen. The operating
frequency and amplitude distribution ranges of the sensors used are 100–400 kHz
100 and 0–100 dB, respectively. The emitted AE signals were acquired by a PCI-2 AE
Coarse aggregate acquisition system, the parameters of which are given in Table 5. It is noted that
Natural sand the threshold of the detection is set to 40 dB to filter the unexpected noise stem-
80 ming from the testing environment. In this study, the AE sensors were stuck using
the following steps: 1) coupling the sensors and specimens using the agent-
Percentage Passing (%)

Vaseline and plastic tape; 2) checking the coupling effect using Pencil Lead Break
(PLB) tests; 3) conducting ten times of the PLB test to obtain the wave propagation
60 speed (WPS) and test the three-dimensional positioning accuracy by AE sensors.

2.4. Loading scheme

40
Two loading scenarios were performed in this study. Before each test, a pre-
loading of 2kN was applied and then was unloaded to zero in order to stabilize
20 the testing system and obtain the complete stress-strain curve originated from zero
point. For monotonic loading, the specimens were subjected to a displacement con-
trol load with a speed of 0.0006 mm/s until the specimen failure, as shown in
0 Fig. 4a. For cyclic loading, a hierarchical loading method with a control displace-
0.01 0.1 1 10 100 ment was adopted for all the tested specimens, as illustrated in Fig. 4b. According
to the monotonic loading results, the displacement increment which was the for-
Sieve size (mm) ward displacement of Electro-hydraulic actuator of the test machine was set to
0.3 mm. The speed was the same as that of the monotonic loading case. The unload-
Fig. 2. Grading curves of fine and coarse aggregates. ing path was unloaded to 0.5kN using a load control with a speed of 0.3kN/s. For

Table 3
Major properties of steel fibers.

No. Density Diameter Length Aspect ratio Elastic modulus Tensile strength Feature
(kg/m3) (mm) (mm) (GPa) (MPa)
HS 7.9 0.5 20 40 200 1100
HM 7.9 0.5 30 60 200 1100 20mm
HL 7.9 0.5 40 80 200 1100 30mm

40mm
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250 1239

Table 4
Details of specimens.

No. Specimen Volume fraction Fiber dosage Aspect ratio Compressive strength Splitting tensile strength
(%) (kg/m3) (MPa) (MPa)
1 H0 – – – 47.53 2.75
2 HM05 0.5 3.95 60 50.76 3.61
3 HM10 1.0 7.9 60 51.92 3.96
4 HM15 1.5 11.85 60 53.65 4.47
5 HM20 2.0 15.8 60 53.05 4.67
6 HS15 1.5 11.85 40 53.55 3.87
7 HL15 1.5 11.85 80 53.24 4.59

Note: Fiber dosage = fiber mass/concrete volume.

Fig. 3. Test setup and instruments.

Table 5
AE recording parameters.
Preamplifier gain
Threshold of detection
Peak definition time, PDT
Hit definition time, HDT
Hit lockout time, HLT
Maximum duration time, MDT
Wave propagation speed, WPS
Event definition value, EDV
Event lockout value, ELV
Attenuation
each sample, ten loading cycles were performed. However, it should be noted that
the displacement of 0.9 mm was not considered in this work in order to avoid the
unloading at peak stress regions.
3. Test results and discussions
the average results of three tests. The detailed results for each mix-
40 dB ture with respect to the peak strength, peak strain (at the maxi-
40 dB mum stress) and residual strength are summarized in Table 6.
50 ls
The residual strength is determined as the stress at the descending
200 ls
300 ls branch when the strain reaches at 3000le. In addition, in an
100 ms attempt to study the energy absorption capacity of concrete, the
4,260,000 mm/s tensile toughness is introduced, and defined as the area under
250DU the stress-strain curves of specimens from 0 up to the 3000le
500DU
0.25 dB/mm
strain. The calculated results of the tensile toughness from the
averaged stress-strain curves are given in Table 6. Moreover, in
order to analyze the damage process of SFRC, the typical relation
between the AE counts and energy versus load with increasing
loading time of SFRC with 2.0% fibers under monotonic loading is
also illustrated, as shown in Fig. 6. It is found that the damage pro-
cess of SFRC can be divided into four stages:

3.1. Monotonic loading (a) Elastic stage (path OA). At this stage, the stress-strain curve
is a linear relation, with no AE signals emitted because the
3.1.1. General response specimen still remains elastic. No damage is freshly induced
Fig. 5 plots the tensile stress-strain curves of SFRC for various and the initial damage has no further development. The steel
fiber parameters under monotonic loading. Each curve represents fibers have no effects on the specimen.
1240 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

(a) Failure (b) u/mm Failure

u/mm uult
uult
0.3kN/s
3.3
3.0 0.0006mm/s
2.7
2.4
2.1
1.8
1.5
1.2 Unloading point
Ultimate unloading
0.6
0.3 point

0 tult t/s 0 tult t/s

Fig. 4. Schematic diagram of loading regimes. (a) Monotonic loading. (b) Cyclic loading.

(a) 6 (b) 6
H0 HS15
5 HM05 5 HM15
HM10 HL15
4
HM15 4
HM20 Stress (MPa)
Stress (MPa)

3 3

2 2

1 1

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000
-6 -6
Strain (10 ) Strain (10 )

Fig. 5. Tensile stress-strain curves of SFRC under monotonic loading. (a) Effect of fiber volume fraction; (b) Effect of fiber aspect ratio.

Table 6
Test results under monotonic tension.

No. Peak strength Peak strain Residual strength Toughness

Measured (MPa) Ra
Measured (le) R b
Measured (MPa) R c
Measured (MPale) Rd
HM0 1.699 1.000 108.131 1.000 – 1.000 82.56 1.000
HM05 1.931 1.137 128.893 1.192 0.259 1.259 1152 13.953
HM10 3.274 1.927 149.654 1.384 0.749 1.749 4547 55.075
HM15 4.449 2.619 162.499 1.503 1.204 2.204 6796 82.316
HM20 5.877 3.459 189.273 1.750 1.545 2.545 8013 97.057
HS15 3.023 1.779 138.534 1.281 1.052 2.052 5108 61.870
HL15 4.701 2.767 180.791 1.672 1.312 2.312 6966 84.375

(b) Micro-cracks propagation stage (path AB). After point A,
the stress-strain curve is shown as linear up to about 90%
of the peak stress. At this interval, few AE signals with very
low energy are captured by the sensors, which may be
accounted for the formation of micro-cracks and evolution
of initial defects. All the AE signals are caused by the matrix
cracking. The AE activities increase with increasing loading
time, which is induced by the nucleation and propagation
of micro-cracks. The steel fibers at this stage still have
insignificant effects on the tensile behavior of concrete, with
no occurrence of fiber sliding. Moreover, no obvious changes
on the specimen surface morphology are observed. Further-
more, only very few shear cracks are detected (Fig. 7a),
which may be induced by the sliding and friction between
the two sides of cracks.
(c) Macro-cracks propagation stage (path BC). When the
stress reaches the peak strength, it has a sharp drop, and
simultaneously, a rapid increase in the AE counts with very
high AE energy as well as the formation of macro visible
cracks on the surfaces of specimens is observed. After that,
the load drops steeply for a slight increase in strain, along
with a large amount of AE signals emitted. It is interestingly
noted that the AE signals and AE energy immediately after
the peak stress are smaller and lower than those at the later
loading stage, which means that at the peak load region, the
AE sources are mainly matrix cracking. However, after that,
fiber sliding and pullout events dominate and contribute to
the occurrence of the large amount of AE activities, with
large amount of shear cracks observed (Fig. 7b). The obser-
vation indicates that the fiber sliding and pullout events
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250 1241

(a) 20 400 (b) 20 400

OA AB BC CD OA AB BC CD

15
B 300 15
B 300

A C
D A C
D
Load (kN)

Load (kN)

Energy
Counts
10 200 10 200

5
D 100 5 D 100

O 0 O 0
0 2000 4000 6000 0 2000 4000 6000

Time (s) Time (s)

Fig. 6. Load and AE response of specimen with 2.0% fibers under monotonic loading: (a) counts; (b) energy.

(a) 500 (b) 500 (c) 500

400 400 400

Tensile crack Tensile crack
Tensile crack
300

AF (kHz)
300
AF (kHz)

300
AF (kHz)

200
Shear crack 200 Shear crack 200 Shear crack

100 100 100

0 0 0
0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20
RA value (ms/V) RA value (ms/V) RA value (ms/V)

Fig. 7. Crack classification results of SFRC with 2.0% fibers under monotonic loading. (a) Point B; (b) point C; (c) point D.

are following after the matrix cracking. At this stage, the for- (a) SFRC with fiber volume fraction ranging from 0.5%, 1.0%,
mation and propagation of macro cracks nearly horizontal 1.5% to 2.0% changes the peak strength by 13.7%, 92.7%,
can be observed. 161.9% and 245.9%, the peak strain by 19.2%, 38.4%, 50.3%
(d) Failure stage (path CD). After point C, the load drop is mod- and 75.0%, the residual strength by 25.9%, 74.9%, 120.4%
erate, and at this stage, the emitting ratio of AE activities and 154.5%, the toughness by 139.53%, 450.075%, 723.16%
remains as a constant with low energy. In this interval, and 870.57%, respectively.
few fresh micro-cracks generate, and the damage is primar- (b) SFRC with fiber aspect ratio ranging from 40, 60 to 80,
ily caused by the propagation of macro-cracks. Moreover, enhances the peak strength by 77.9%, 161.9% and 176.7%,
more shear cracks are found than path BC (Fig. 7c). The AE the peak strain by 28.1%, 50.3% and 67.2%, the residual
sources in this stage are fiber sliding and pullout as well as strength by 105.2%, 120.4% and 131.2%, the toughness by
split cracks induced by deformed waves on hooked-end 518.70%, 723.16% and 743.75%, respectively.
fibers. (c) The effect of steel fiber volume fraction on the tensile
mechanical properties of concrete is more pronounced than
3.1.2. Effects of steel fibers that of the fiber aspect ratio.
It is observed from Fig. 5 that the steel fiber has a significant
effect on the stress-strain behavior of SFRC under monotonic ten- The increases of the tensile mechanical properties of concrete
sion. All ascending branches of the stress-strain curves are linear. could be attributed to the effective fiber crack-bridging effect
However, the peak loads and load drops at the peak strain vary geffective [52], which is the function of fiber-matrix bond strength
for various fiber parameters. For plain concrete (H0), the tensile sf, volume fraction Vf and aspect ratio lf /df, and given as:
strength is only 1.699 MPa, and the load has a sudden drop to zero geffectiv e ¼ sf V f ðlf =df Þ ð1Þ
immediately when the load reaches the peak strength, with the
specimens breaking into two segments, showing an obvious brittle It is obviously seen from Eq. (1) that for an identical steel fiber, a
failure mode. While for SFRC, the stress-strain curves have distinct higher fiber volume fraction or aspect ratio provides stronger fiber
descending branches. The specimen can hold and maintain the ten- crack-bridging and load-carrying capacities as well as the tensile
sile load at the peak strain due to fiber crack-bridging effect. The properties of concrete.
load drop decreases with an increase in the steel fiber volume frac-
tion and aspect ratio. 3.2. Cyclic loading
With respect to the key mechanical properties, it is observed
that a significant increase in the peak strength and peak strain of 3.2.1. General response
concrete with the increase of fiber parameters, showing a more Fig. 8a illustrates the typical cyclic stress-strain curves of SFRC.
ductile post-peak behavior. In details, in comparison with plain For the aim to evaluate the damage progression of SFRC under cyc-
concrete (H0), lic tension, the unloading stiffness at each loading cycle which is
1242 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

defined as the slope of the initial and ultimate points on the
unloading curves is calculated. The relation of elastic stiffness ver-
sus the unloading strain is plotted in Fig. 8b. Moreover, it is well
known that the elastic stiffness degradation closely related to the
damage accumulation during the loading process is a critical
aspect to reflect the damage degree and its evolution of concrete.
Therefore, the damage evolution law can be characterized by the
elastic stiffness degradation process of SFRC. In the present study,
a scalar damage index d is introduced and defined in Eq. (2). The
damage threshold value ranges from 0 and 1.0. The value 0 repre-
sents that there is no damage in concrete, and the value 1.0 indi-
cates that the concrete material has been completely damaged.
The definition of it is schematically shown in Fig. 9.
Eunl
d¼1
E0
Where, d is the damage index, Eunl is the unloading elastic stiffness,
E0 is the initial elastic modulus of concrete materials.
Additionally, the load levels and AE activities (counts and
energy) versus loading time relation that is also related to the dam-
age evolution process is shown in Fig. 8d–f. It is observed from
those figures that:
(1) Unloading and reloading paths: Two well defined paths are
observed for an internal cycle of the stress-strain curve. The
unloading branch is almost linearly decreasing. The reload-
ing path is linear from the strain axis to the envelope curve.
When the strain exceeds the envelope unloading strain in
the internal loading cycle, the nonlinearity of the curve is
observed, which becomes more obvious once the curve
ð2Þ accesses to the envelope curve.

(a) 6 (d) 30 400

Cyclic stress-strain curve AE counts

5 25
300
4 20 Cyclic load
Stress (MPa)

Load (kN)

Counts
3 15 200

2 10
100
1 5

0 0 0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 0 2000 4000 6000 8000
-6
Strain (10 ) Time (s)
(b) 50
(e) 30 1500

25
40 Cyclic load AE energy 1200
Elastic stiffness (GPa)

Elasc sffness progress 20

30 900
Load (kN)

Energy
15
20 600
10

10 300
5

0 0 0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 0 2000 4000 6000 8000
-6
Strain (10 ) Time (s)
(c) 1.0 (f) 300000

250000
0.8 Cumulave AE counts
Cumulative AE counts

200000
Damage index

0.6
150000
0.4
100000

0.2
Damage evoluon process
50000

0.0 0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 0 2000 4000 6000 8000
-6
Strain (10 ) Time (s)

Fig. 8. Load and AE response of specimen with 2.0% fibers under cyclic loading.
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250
Peak point
Stress drop
Unloading point
E0
Unloading point
Eunl, j
Eunl, i
Fig. 9. Definition of damage index.
(2) Performance degradation: Significant degradation in the
elastic stiffness and stress are observed for all the cyclic
curves. The elastic stiffness before the peak strength is
almost identical to the initial elastic stiffness. However, after
the peak stress, the stiffness decreases with increasing load-
ing cycles. For the reloading path, significant deterioration in
concrete strength can be seen in comparison with the envel-
ope unloading stress at the same unloading strain, which is
caused by the crack propagation and damage accumulation.
(3) Energy dissipation: Prior to the peak stress, the hysteretic
loop formed by the unloading and reloading paths is
insignificant, where the two referred paths are almost trac-
ing together because the specimen almost remains as an
elastomer. However, in the post-peak region, the hysteretic
loop is more notable with increasing loading cycles.
(4) AE response: The AE response and damage behavior of SFRC
under cyclic tension is similar to those under the monotonic
case. However, AE signals mainly occur on the reloading
path, and at the unloading path, no signals are emitted, with
the damage value d remains as a constant. Moreover, the
Kaiser effect which is a phenomenon of hardly generating
AE activity until the load reaches the previous stress level
[56] is observed. In this study, the load is displacement con-
trolled, as a result, when the displacement on the reloading
path does not reach the unloading displacement, no AE sig-
nals are found.
3.2.2. Envelope curve
The stress-strain curves of SFRC under cyclic tension for various
fiber parameters are shown in Fig. 10. Each curve represents a
selection from a group of three. The envelope curve which is
referred as a boundary of the cyclic responses of concrete are
included. Moreover, the monotonic curves are also shown in
Fig. 10 for comparison.
It is observed that in general, the monotonic curve lies closely to
the cyclic curve, with only a mild deviation. The hypothesis of
envelope curve that the monotonic stress-strain curve of a speci-
men can be substituted as its cyclic envelope curve also seems true
for SFRC under tension. Based on the above observations, on the
analogy of concrete behavior under compression, the monotonic
tensile stress-strain equation of SFRC can be used to model the cyc-
lic envelope curve of concrete. This hypothesis is evidenced by sim-
ilar observation in literature [33].
1243
3.2.3. Plastic strain
Plastic strain is a critical parameter for modeling the cyclic
loading response of concrete. The relation between plastic strain
and envelope unloading strain is an important aspect. Fig. 11
compares the relations of plastic strain and envelope unloading
strain for different specimens. It can be inferred that when the
unloading strain is less than the peak strain of the stress-strain
curve, the plastic strain is near zero. And then, the plastic strain
almost has a linear increase with increasing unloading strain.
Moreover, steel fibers have little effect on the plastic strain of
concrete, not only for fiber volume fraction, but aspect ratio. It
means that for a given unloading strain, the plastic strain is
almost the same. The observation is schematically illustrated in
Fig. 12. It is demonstrated from the results in the literature that
the plastic strain is mainly determined by the unloading strain
and the effect of the external factors such as fibers and confined
tubes is insignificant [17,18]. The reasons for this maybe that the
induced mechanisms of the plastic strain of concrete mainly are
consisted of two aspects, namely, the unclosed part of cracks,
and slip and dislocation of grains. For the former, due to the high
elastic stiffness of steel fibers, when the load is unloaded to zero,
the sliding displacement of the fibers cannot be recovered when
the crack closes, but the deformation of the concrete matrix can
be recovered. For the latter, the slip and dislocation of the cement
paste grains occur at the meso- or micro scales, the macro-scale
steel fibers have no influence on this mechanical behavior. There-
fore, the influence of steel fibers can be neglected in establishing
the analytical equation of plastic strain. At present, various for-
mulations for the relation of plastic strain and unloading strain
of concrete under cyclic tension have been suggested [35–40].
Based on the analysis of the test results, the linear function is
selected to predict the relationship curve. The equation is
obtained in Eq. (3) and shown in Fig. 12, with the effects of steel
fibers neglected.
(
0 et  etu
epl ¼ ð3Þ
0:987et  78:291 et > etu
Where, epl is the plastic strain, eunl is the envelope unloading strain.
3.2.4. Elastic stiffness degradation
Elastic stiffness degradation is an important aspect to character-
ize the damage degree and its evolution of concrete. As stated
before, the elastic stiffness for a loading cycle is taken as the slope
from the envelope unloading point to the ultimate unloading point.
The calculated stiffness values for each concrete mixture are sum-
marized in Table 7.
The elastic stiffness degradation process of SFRC for different
fiber parameters under cyclic tension is shown in Fig. 13. It is found
that the steel fiber has a significant effect on the stiffness degrada-
tion process of concrete. The stiffness degradation can be signifi-
cantly alleviated by the incorporation of steel fibers. Moreover,
an increase in the steel fiber volume fraction and aspect ratio can
lead to an increase in the elastic stiffness at a same unloading
strain, indicating a slower stiffness degradation process. Further-
more, it is interesting to find that the steel fibers have insignificant
effects on the plastic strain of concrete. Therefore, accounted for
the definition of elastic stiffness, for a specified unloading strain,
the stiffness degradation is governed by the envelope unloading
stress (see in Fig. 12). From the above analysis, it can be concluded
that the stiffness degradation (damage evolution) process of SFRC
under cyclic tension is just driven by the envelope curve in this
study.
1244 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

(a) 6 (b) 6
HM05 Cyclic loading HM10 Cyclic loading
5 Envelope curve 5 Envelope curve
Monotonic loading Monotonic loading
4 4
Stress (MPa)

Stress (MPa)
3 3

2 2

1 1

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000
-6 -6
Strain (10 ) Strain (10 )

(c) 6 (d) 6
Cyclic loading Cyclic loading
HM15 HM20
5 Envelope curve 5 Envelope curve
Monotonic loading Monotonic loading
4 4

Stress (MPa)
Stress (MPa)

3 3

2 2

1 1

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000
-6 -6
Strain (10 ) Strain (10 )

(e) 6 (f) 6
HS15 Cyclic loading HL15 Cyclic loading
5 Envelope curve 5 Envelope vurve
Monotonic loading Monotonic loading
4 4
Stress (MPa)

Stress (MPa)

3 3

2 2

1 1

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000
-6 -6
Strain (10 ) Strain (10 )

Fig. 10. Stress-strain relations of SFRC under cyclic tension.

3.3. Cumulative AE activity
The relations of cumulative AE counts and loading time of SFRC
for various fiber parameters under monotonic and cyclic tension
are shown in Figs. 14 and 15, respectively. The results indicate that
there is nearly no AE response observed for plain concrete (H0),
while the AE behavior of SFRC is obvious. Moreover, the cumulative
AE counts increase with increasing fiber parameters. This observa-
tion is attributed that each fiber pullout or sliding would be a
potential AE event [47], which is proportional to the fiber content
and length. For plain concrete, the AE activities are mainly pro-
duced by the matrix cracking or aggregate-matrix debonding,
while for SFRC, except for those in plain concrete, steel fiber sliding
and pullout as well as the split micro-cracks induced by deformed
hooked-ends of fibers also contribute to the AE activities [57]. In
addition, the effect of steel fiber parameters on the cumulative
AE counts under cyclic loading exhibits similar laws as those under
monotonic loading.
3.4. Failure mechanism
The effects of fiber parameters on the crack classification of the
failure mode of SFRC are shown in Figs. 16 and 17. Moreover, in
order to uncover the failure mode of SFRC, the typical AE source
location results of SFRC are also presented in Figs. 16 and 17,
respectively. Each plotted point (in red) indicates a detected AE
source. It is seen that the cracks scattering and AE source location
points of SFRC are much more than those of plain concrete, and the
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250 1245

4000 SFRC, cracks have complete propagation accounted for the fiber
2 effect, which induces more AE events. And the shear cracks of SFRC
R =0.999
induced by fiber sliding and pullout increase with increasing fiber
SD=0.001
3000 volume fraction. With respect to the effect of fiber aspect ratio, it is
inferred from Fig. 17 that the amount of AE source points as well as
εpl=0.987εunl-78.291
Plastic strain (με)

the points distributed at shear crack regions increases with

HM05 increasing fiber aspect ratio. Besides, it is also found that the AE
2000 HM10 events mainly occur at the main crack regions, with a large amount
HM15 of location points nucleated, and only a few points distribute
HM20 around the main cracks. The main cracks of SFRC specimens are
1000 HS15 not trim, and a mass of visible cracks with small width exist at
HL15 the main cracks. From the above analysis, it can be summarized
Fitting that the determination of the fracture mode of concrete transfers
0 from tensile cracks to shear cracks with increasing fiber volume
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 fraction.
Unloading strain (με)
4. Tensile constitutive model for SFRC
Fig. 11. Plastic strain versus envelope unloading strain of SFRC for various fiber
volume fractions and aspect ratios.
Based on the experimental results and corresponding analysis,
constitutive models are developed to generalize the stress-strain
response curves of SFRC for different fiber parameters. A mono-
tonic stress-strain model is supposed to model the cyclic envelope
curve using the concept of damage and elasto-plasticity. The cyclic
unloading and reloading paths are all simplified as a base line. The
model in this study is shown in Fig. 9.
C1
4.1. Damage evolution law

B1 Results in Fig. 18 show that the damage almost remains zero

C2
A1
B2
A2
O a þ bece
Fig. 12. Schematic of the stiffness for variable concrete mixtures at the same
unloading strain.
points increase with the increase of fiber volume fraction. Specifi-
cally, for plain concrete, only few AE source location points are
observed, which indicates cracks do not propagate with increasing
loading displacement. Moreover, only a few points distribute at the
shear crack region. The failure of plain concrete is just determined
by tensile cracks, with an obvious brittle failure mode. While, for
when the load reaches the peak strength. Therefore, the damage
process in this study should be divided into two segments, and
there exists a threshold value which can be assumed as the peak
strain of SFRC. Over decades, substantial equations for damage
evolution laws of concrete have been suggested [18]. In this work,
based on a regression analysis of damage evolution process of
SFRC, the following equation is adopted and described as:

0 e  etu
d¼ ð5Þ
e > etu
Where, d is the scalar damage variable, e is the strain, a, b and c are
the controlling parameters. Using the suggested equation, the fit-
ting parameters of the damage evolution curves of SFRC for various
fiber parameters are summarized in Table 8.
As previous discussions, the mechanical response of SFRC is clo-
sely related to fiber reinforcing index RI (defined in Eq. (1)). In this
study, for the same fiber, the fiber reinforcing index is expressed
as:
RI ¼ V f ðlf =df Þ ð6Þ

Table 7
Elastic stiffness of SFRC for various fiber volume fractions and aspect ratios.

Cycle HM05 HM10 HM15 HM20 HS15 HL15

eunl (le) Eunl (MPa) eunl (le) Eunl (MPa) eunl (le) Eunl (MPa) eunl (le) Eunl (MPa) eunl (le) Eunl (MPa) eunl (le) Eunl (MPa)
1 48.51 37188.21 26.99 43499.20 25.85 46305.61 56.23 48688.07 46.61 50419.45 32.23 50763.31
2 316.78 2155.08 294.12 30068.26 282.98 40309.64 108.13 44636.53 166.04 46928.01 272.98 46625.06
3 697.23 1756.63 542.39 23600.56 657.23 24876.21 200.69 40807.88 356.40 31964.70 552.77 37476.45
4 1018.93 1694.79 769.90 18223.34 945.50 22439.82 438.58 36173.59 532.00 26639.05 832.18 32617.30
5 1369.38 1620.92 996.26 10110.97 1253.29 18275.26 687.23 31637.33 842.56 17992.08 1110.73 25762.46
6 1720.00 1554.11 1348.62 9215.37 1565.09 15888.48 966.26 25614.68 1317.47 13862.44 1473.18 23025.02
7 2080.76 1401.48 1690.31 8935.02 2051.52 14543.35 1297.58 18013.84 1782.87 11851.39 1875.92 20351.37
8 2412.84 1354.27 2041.52 7227.32 2517.30 11016.02 1648.79 17387.53 2258.65 11424.13 2268.65 18790.25
9 2793.67 1298.37 2372.84 6743.02 2930.79 9519.18 2010.38 16562.23 2724.05 11343.99 2692.53 18609.23
10 – – 2692.53 6417.31 – – 2352.46 12213.43 3219.83 10961.23 3107.27 16646.73
11 – – 3075.36 5542.42 – 2620.35 10393.01 – – 3551.52 14615.38
1246 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

(a) 60 (b) 60
HM05 HS15
50 HM10 50 HM15
HM15 HL15

Elastic stiffness (GPa)

Elastic stiffness (GPa)

40
HM20 40

30 30

20 20

10 10

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 0 1000 2000 3000
-6 -6
Unloading strain (10 ) Unloading strain (10 )

Fig. 13. Elastic stiffness degradation process of SFRC. (a) Effect of fiber volume fraction; (b) Effect of fiber aspect ratio.

(a) 2000000 (b) 2000000

H0 HS15
HM05 HM15
1500000 HM10 Cumulative AE counts 1500000 HL15
Cumulative AE counts

HM15
HM20
1000000 1000000

500000 500000

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000
Time (s) Time (s)

Fig. 14. Cumulative AE counts for SFRC under monotonic loading: (a) effect of fiber volume fraction; (b) effect of fiber aspect ratio.

(a) 600000 (b) 300000

H0 HS15
500000 HM05 250000 HM15
Cumulative AE counts
Cumulative AE counts

HM10 HL15
400000 HM15 200000
HM20
300000 150000

200000 100000

100000 50000

0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000
Time (s) Time (s)

Fig. 15. Cumulative AE counts for SFRC under cyclic loading: (a) effect of fiber volume fraction; (b) effect of fiber aspect ratio.

Where, RI is the fiber reinforcing index; Vf ,lf/df are the fiber volume 4.2. Cyclic envelope curve
fraction and aspect ratio, respectively. Based on the analysis of the
test results, the parameters in Eq. (5) are determined in Eqs. (7)–(9), From Fig. 9, the stress-strain model of concrete can be described
with the fitting standard deviations of 0.976, 0.996 and 0.999, as:
respectively. The fitting results are shown in Fig. 19.
rt ¼ ð1  dt ÞEft ðet  epl Þ ð10Þ
a ¼ 1:0  0:226RI ð7Þ
Where, rt and et are the tensile stress and strain, Eft is the elastic
b ¼ 1:0 þ 0:238RI ð8Þ modulus of SFRC, dt is the elasto-plastic damage index, epl is the plas-
tic strain. The equation of dt is shown in Eq. (5). In this work, the elas-
c ¼ 0:001 þ 0:242e10RI ð9Þ tic modulus, Eft , of SFRC is defined as the slope of the ascending
branch of stress-train curves, which is the ratio of peak stress to peak
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250 1247

(a) 500
(b) 500 (c) 500

400 400 400

Tensile crack Tenslie crack
Tensile crack
300 300 300
AF (kHz)

AF (kHz)

AF (kHz)
200 200 Shear crack 200
Shear crack Shear crack
100 100 100

0 0 0
0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20
RA value (ms/V) RA value (ms/V) RA value (ms/V)

Fig. 16. Influence of fiber volume fraction on the crack classification of SFRC. (a) 0% fiber. (b) 1.0% fiber. (c) 2.0% fiber.

(a) 500 (b) 500 (c) 500

400 400 400

Tensile crack Tenslie crack Tensile crack
300 300 300
AF (kHz)

AF (kHz)

AF (kHz)
200
Shear crack 200 200 Shear crack
Shear crack
100 100 100

0 0 0
0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20
RA value (ms/V) RA value (ms/V) RA value (ms/V)

Fig. 17. Influence of fiber aspect ratio on the crack classification of SFRC under cyclic loading. (a) 40; (b) 60; (c) 80.

(a) 1.0 (b) 1.0

0.8 0.8
Damage index
Damage index

0.6 0.6

0.4 HM05 0.4

HM10 HS15
0.2 HM15 0.2 HM15
HM20 HL15
Fitting curves Fitting curves
0.0 0.0
0 1000 2000 3000 0 1000 2000 3000
-6 -6
Unloading strain (10 ) Unloading strain (10 )
Fig. 18. Damage evolution laws of SFRC: (a) effect of fiber volume fraction; (b) effect of fiber aspect ratio.

Table 8
Fitting results of damage evolution laws of SFRC.

Specimen RI a b c R2
HM0 0 1.0 0 – –
HM05 0.3 0.959 0.989 0.0151 0.999
HM10 0.6 0.872 0.919 0.0016 0.986
HM15 0.9 0.804 0.850 0.0011 0.980
HM20 1.2 0.759 0.769 0.0009 0.986
HS15 0.6 0.887 0.908 0.0020 0.988
HL15 1.2 0.720 0.773 0.0010 0.988

strain. Based on the test results in current and literature [16,58,59], eft ¼ et ð1 þ 0:61RIÞ ð12Þ
the peak stress and the corresponding strain are given in Eq. (11)
and (12). The fitting results of them are illustrated in Fig. 20, with
Where, fft and eft are the peak strength and peak strain of SFRC,
the fitting standard deviations of 0.985 and 0.999, respectively.
respectively. ft and et are those corresponding to plain concrete,
f ft ¼ f t ð1 þ 0:56RIÞ ð11Þ respectively.
1248 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250

(a) (b) (c)

1.1 -0.7 0.016
Fitting results
1.0
y=1.0-0.226x y=-1.0+0.238x Prediction
-0.8 0.012

0.9
-0.9 0.008 y=0.001+0.242exp(-10x)

c
b
a

0.8

Fitting results -1.0 Fitting results 0.004

0.7
Prediction Prediction

0.6 -1.1 0.000

0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2

Fiber reinforcing index Fiber reinforcing index Fiber reinforcing index

Fig. 19. Fitting results of parameter a, b and c: (a) parameter a; (b) parameter b; (c) parameter c.

(a) 4 (b) 3.0

Current study Current study
Han et al. 2.5 Han et al.
3 Mei et al. Mei et al.
Yang et al. Yang et al.
2.0
Fitting results Fitting results
2 1.5
fts/ft

εft/εt

1.0
1 y=1+0.61x
0.5
y=1+0.56x
0 0.0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2

Fiber reinforcing index Fiber reinforcing index

Fig. 20. Fitting results of peak stress and peak strain of SFRC: (a) peak stress; (b) peak strain.

(a) (b) (c)

5 5 5
Test results Test results Test result
4 Model 4 Model Model results
4

E0=22GPa E0=20GPa E0=21.6GPa

Stress (MPa)

Stress (MPa)

Stress (MPa)

3 3 3
Vf =1.5% Vf =1.0% Vf =1.0%
2 2 2
lf /df =60 lf /df =65 lf /df =30
1 1 1

0 0 0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 1000 2000 3000 4000
-6 -6 -6
Strain (10 ) Strain (10 ) Strain (10 )
(d) (e) (f)
7 5 6
Test result Test result Experiment
6 Model results Model results 5 Model
4
5 E0E=28GPa
E0=26.5GPa E0=27.5GPa 4 =28GPa
0
Stress (MPa)
Stress (MPa)
Stress (MPa)

4 3
Vf =1.0% VfV=2.0%
=2.0%
Vf =1.5% 3
3 l /d =60
f f
2 lf /d f =60
lf /df =80 lf /df =49.2 2
2
1 1
1

0 0 0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 0 100 200 300 400 500 0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000
-6 -6 -6
Strain (10 ) Strain (10 ) Strain (10 )

Fig. 21. Model validation of experimental and predicted results of SFRC under monotonic loading: (a) Xu et al. [16], (b–d) Yang and Huang [58]; (e) Han and Zhao [59]; and
cyclic loading: (f) current study: HM20.
 B. Li et al. / Construction and Building Materials 190 (2018) 1236–1250
4.3. Unloading and reloading path
As stated above, the unloading and reloading paths are almost
tracing together and can be modeled as a line. The equations of
them are shown as:
rt ¼ Eun ðet  epl Þ ð13Þ
run
Eun ¼ ð14Þ
eun  epl;un
Where, Eunl is the unloading elastic stiffness for an internal loading
cycle, runl and eunl are the stress and strain on the envelope curve,
eun,pl is the plastic strain at this internal cycle, which can be calcu-
lated using Eq. (2).
4.4. Model verification
Fig. 21 documents the typical comparisons between test results
and model predictions in current study and literature. The model
parameters are included in respective figures. It is found that the
typical mechanical properties of concrete in terms of peak stress
and peak strain agree well with the test results for all the compar-
isons. However, due to the definition of the damage threshold (see
in Eq. (5)), the ascending branches of all the stress-strain curves are
linear up to the peak strength, which has a little difference when
compared to the testing curve. For the descending branches, it
can be seen that the model predicting curves are close to the mea-
sured testing curves, which indicates that the developed model can
well estimate the post-peak behavior of SFRC under uniaxial ten-
sion. Given the above mentioned comparisons and analysis, there
are reasons to believe that the proposed model can provide a good
prediction of the tensile mechanical responses of SFRC under
monotonic and cyclic loading cases.
However, it should be noted that due to the gap of the cyclic ten-
sile tests of SFRC, the constitutive model for the cyclic loading case
in this work is only validated by the test results in current study.
5. Conclusions
Based on the present study, the main conclusions can be drawn:
(1) The incorporation of steel fiber significantly improves the
monotonic and cyclic tensile behavior of SFRC due to fiber
crack-bridging effect. The peak stress, peak strain, residual
strength, toughness and ductility of SFRC increase drastically
as well with increasing fiber parameters. The fiber volume frac-
tion shows a more pronounced effect than that of aspect ratio.
(2) The monotonic tensile curve lies closely to the cyclic envel-
ope curve of SFRC. Remarkable elastic stiffness degradation
of concrete is observed with increasing loading cycles, and
the degradation rate is remarkably alleviated as the fiber
volume fraction or aspect ratio increases. Moreover, the steel
fibers have no significant influence on the plastic strain
accumulation that is linear with the envelope unloading
strain. The unloading elastic stiffness of SFRC is only deter-
mined by the envelope stress, which is notably influenced
by steel fibers.
(3) It is noted from AE results that a rapid damage evolution can
be observed at the formation of the first crack, with the
occurrence of a stress drop and a release of concentrated
AE signals which have very high AE energy due to the fiber
sliding response. The total AE activities are proportional to
the fiber parameters for both monotonic and cyclic loading
protocols. Besides, the Kaiser effect is also observed for the
cyclic loading case.
1249
(4) The determination of the failure mode of concrete changes
from tensile cracks to shear cracks with increasing fiber vol-
ume fraction. The AE events, shear cracks and AE source
location points of SFRC increase with an increase in the fiber
parameters.
(5) In addition, based on the elastic stiffness degradation pro-
cess, an exponential function is suggested to characterize
the damage evolution laws of SFRC. Finally, using the con-
cept of elasto-plasticity and damage mechanics, a constitu-
tive model is developed to generalize the monotonic and
cyclic stress-strain responses of SFRC, with the effect of steel
fiber taken into consideration. The model provides a close
estimation of the results in the present study and literature.
Conflict of interest
The authors declared that there is no conflict of interest.
Acknowledgement
This present research work was supported by the Chinese
National Natural Science Foundations (Grant No. 51608397 and
Grant No. 51738011). The support is gratefully acknowledged.
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