Experimental and numerical studies on GGBS based fibrous geopolymer concrete beams

Abstract

This paper presents the investigations carried out on Ground Granulated Blast furnace Slags (GGBS) based geopolymer concrete beams with and without glass fibres. The main ingredients considered for the study include constant GGBS, varying proportions of fly ash, silica fume and metakaolin. Beams were tested under four point bending and various responses such as first crack load, ultimate load, deflection corresponding to ultimate load and crack pattern were studied. From the experimental investigations, it was observed that the behaviour of the beams are similar to RC beams. Nonlinear finite element analysis (FE) has been carried out on RC flexural members made up of GGBS with and without considering glass fibres. The non linear properties of concrete and steel are considered for simulation. The widely used concrete damage model available in ABAQUS has been employed to represent the nonlinear behavior of concrete. The integrity of all the elements i.e. concrete and steel has been ensured by applying the appropriate constraint conditions. Static nonlinear analysis has been conducted and the responses such as peak load and the deformations are compared with the corresponding experimental observations. It is observed that the responses obtained from FE analysis are in close agreement with the corresponding experimental values.