Fibre Reinforced Polymer Built-Up Beams and One-Way Slabs

An adhesively bonded modular GFRP web-flange sandwich system for use in building floor construction is described in this chapter. Sandwich units are developed by incorporating standard pultruded GFRP box (i.e. square hollow section) or I-profiles between two GFRP flat panels to form built-up modular sections with considerable improvement of bending stiffness. These modular sections may then be assembled in the transverse direction to form a one-way spanning slab system. Sandwich specimens with different span-to-depth ratios and core configurations were prepared via adhesively bonding the component profiles, and were then tested under four-point bending. It can be found that the span-to-depth ratio greatly influenced the failure mode, and that inserting foam into the core of the sandwich significantly improved the load-carrying capacity. Also, adhesive bonding was able to provide full composite action at both serviceability and ultimate loads, depending on the quality of the bond. Finally, structural theory was used to estimate the bending stiffness and load-carrying capacity of the sandwich specimens and good agreement with the experimental results was found.