SHEAR STRENGTH OF STEEL FIBRE-

REINFORCED CONCRETE BEAMS

WITHOUT STIRRUPS

Presented By,

Structural Engineering
 SHEAR FORCE
• Shear force is present in beams at sections
where there is a change in bending moment
along the span.
• Transversely loaded reinforced concrete
beams may fail in shear before attaining
their full flexural strengths if they are not
adequately designed for shear.
• Shear failures are very sudden and
unexpected
 SHEAR FORCE
• Shear force is resisted by the combined
action of
i. the uncracked concrete in compression
region.
ii.the aggregate interlocking.
iii.the shear acting across the longitudinal
steel bars.
 SHEAR
• The unbalanced shear in excess of the three
combined factors is resisted by the shear
reinforcement.
• The shear reinforcement is generally
provided in the form of vertical stirrups.
• This may sometimes cause congestion in
reinforcement.
 SHEAR FAILURE
• The failure of beam considered in shear is
induced by cracks outside the central section of
the beam.
• The shear failure of reinforced concrete
members without stirrups initiates when the
principal tensile stress within the shear span
exceeds the tensile strength of concrete.
• It results in initiation of diagonal crack which
later propagates through the beam web.
 MODES OF FAILURE
• The various failure modes in shear without
web reinforcement are

a)Diagonal Tension failure

b)Shear compression failure
c)Splitting or true shear failure
 DIAGONAL TENSION FAILURE

• It is most common in
shear span when the
a/d ratio is above 2.
• It does not lead to
sudden failures.
• It may stop at point 1
and with increased
Diagonal tension failure
load extend beyond 2
causing failure.
 SHEAR COMPRESSION
FAILURE
• This failure occurs at a
range of a/d between
1.0 and 2.5.
• Large shear in short
shear spans may
initiates approximately
a 45° crack.
• A compression failure
Shear compression failure
finally occurs adjacent
to the load.
 SPLITTING OR TRUE SHEAR FAILURE

• This failure occurs

when a/d is less than
unity.
• When the shear span
is less than the
effective depth d, the
shear crack is carried
as an inclined between Splitting shear failure
load and reaction.
• Shear strength is much
higher in such cases.
 STEEL FIBRES
• Steel fibres are filaments
of wire, deformed and
cut to lengths, for
reinforcement of
concrete, mortar and
other composite
materials.
• It is a cold drawn wire
fibre with corrugated
and flatted shape.
• Steel fibres are crack
arrestors.
 STEEL FIBRES
• The addition of steel fibers to a reinforced
concrete beam is known to increase its
shear strength.
• The use of steel fibers is more efficient in
high-strength concrete, which can be
relatively brittle without fibers.
• Conventional stirrups can be eliminated,
which reduces reinforcement congestion.
 EXPERIMENT
Experiments conducted by Adebar et al
Batson, Jenkins, and Spatney on fibre
reinforced beams are illustrated below.
• In conventional reinforced concrete beams, the
ultimate shear strength decreases with
increasing shear span depth ratio a/d and
concrete compressive strength fc .
• These effects cause arch and dowel action in
beams with low values of a/d, and diagonal-
tension failure mode in beams with higher
values of a/d.
 Experiment
• The increase in shear strength depends on
the amount of fibers, expressed as the fiber
volume fraction Vf ,aspect ratio and
anchorage conditions for the steel fibers.
• Twelve reinforced concrete beams were
tested to failure to evaluate the influence of
fiber-volume fraction, a/d and concrete
compressive strength on beam strength and
ductility.
Test procedure
EQUIPMENT
• All beams have identical cross sections.
• Stirrups are provided only at the supports.
• Two equal loads were applied to the beam.
• Deflections were imposed by increasing
load in small increments.
• The deflection and applied load were
recorded at mid span.
 Force-displacement relation
• Typical force-
deflection relationship
are shown in fig.
• As the fibre content
increased, both
maximum applied load
and ultimate deflection
increased.

Typical force-deflection histories (a/d = 2)

 FAILURE PATTERN
• The presence of steel
fibres in concrete greatly
affected the observed
cracking pattern.
• The numbers next to the
cracks refer to the load
at which cracks were
observed.
• The beam FHB1-2 does
not have steel fibres and
sudden failure is
observed. Typical crack patterns (a/d = 2)
TEST RESULTS
Shear stress variation

Influence of a/d on shear resistance

 Shear stress variation
• The ultimate shear stress at failure decreased
with increasing a/d.
• The average shear stress at the onset of shear
cracking decreased with increasing a/d
• The difference in capacity between beams
with a/d = 2 and a/d = 3 was significantly
larger than the difference between beams
with a/d = 3 and a/d = 4.
 Shear resistance

Influence of fiber volume on increased shear resistance.

 Shear resistance
• The strength of the fiber-reinforced beams ranged
from 122 to 180% of the strength of the beams
without fibers.
• The strength increase was particularly large (69 to
80%) for the beams with low a/d (a/d = 2.0), which
failed in a combination of shear and flexure
• For larger a/d, the increase in strength ranged
from 22 to 38%.
• The increase in cracking shear ranged from 13 to
33% of the cracking shear of similar beams
without fibers.
Comparison of beams with stirrups and with
steel fibres
Failure pattern of beams with
stirrups
 Failure pattern of beams with
stirrups
• The failure pattern of the beams shown in Fig
indicates that for a/d 1 and 2 crack initiated
approximately at 45degrees to the longitudinal axis of
the beam.
• A compression failure finally occurred adjacent to the
load which is designated as a shear compression
failure.
• For a/d 3 and 4 the diagonal crack starts from the last
flexural crack and turned gradually into a crack more
and more inclined under the shear loading.
• The failure is designated as diagonal tension failure.
 CONCLUSIONS
• Steel fibres are crack arrestors.
• The beams with small a/d value carried more load after
shear cracking than the beams with large a/d values.
• Of the nine beams that contained steel fibers, only two
failed in pure shear and two failed in a combination of
flexure and shear.
• Five beams with fibers failed in flexure, provide only a
lower bound on the shear strength.
• Concrete beams without fibers failed in shear which
corresponds to sudden failure along a single shear crack.
• Steel fibres are easily available and cost effective when
compared with polymer fibres.
 REFERENCES
• Yoon-Keun Kwak, Marc O. Eberhard, Woo-Suk Kim, and
Jubum Kim ;“Shear Strength of Steel Fiber-Reinforced
Concrete Beams without Stirrups” : ACI Structural
Journal/July-August 2002.
• Sudheer Reddy.L 1, Ramana Rao .N.V , Gunneswara Rao
T.D ; “Shear Resistance of High Strength Concrete Beams
Without Shear Reinforcement ”: International journal of civil
and structural engineering volume 1, 2010.
• Dileep Kumar P.G; “Shear strength of R.C.C beams without
web reinforcement” .
• www.steelfiber.org
• www.greensteelgroup.com