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Behavior of GFRP retrofitted reinforced concrete slabs subjected to conventional explosive blast

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Abstract

Majority of protective engineering in China has typically been designed to resist explosion of nuclear weapon instead of conventional explosive blast. This paper proposed a retrofitting method to improve the blast resistance of existing reinforced concrete (RC) slabs against conventional explosion using externally bonded glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) strips. In order to assess the effectiveness of GFRP strips in enhancing the blast resistance of RC slabs, a series of underground blast tests for the first time were conducted. Five square RC slabs, including one companion control specimen and four GFRP retrofitted slabs, were subjected to blast loading generated from the detonation of high explosives ranging from 400 to 1400 g of trinitrotoluene (TNT). The reflected blast pressure, acceleration and central deflection of the slabs were measured and analyzed as well as the strains of steel bars, concrete and GFRP strips. The post-blast damage and failure mode of each slab were carefully investigated to determine the failure mechanism. The effects of charge burial and standoff distance on the blast pressure and structural response were analyzed in detail. The test results indicate that overall the GFRP retrofitted slabs performed much better and survived higher explosive blast than the control slab. Externally bonded GFRP strips strengthening can effectively increase the ultimate blast resistant capacity of RC slabs against conventional explosive blast.

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Acknowledgements

The experiments were conducted at the Anti-blasting Research Laboratory of PLA University of Science and Technology. The authors wish to gratefully acknowledge the support of these organizations for this study.

Funding

This study was funded by National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 50708045).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Civil Engineering, Nanjing Tech University, Nanjing, 211800, China

    Zhanggen Guo, Zhenwen Xu, Chen Chen & Bing Zhang

  2. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 98195-2700, USA

    Dawn E. Lehman

  3. School of Civil Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, 210096, China

    Shuangyin Cao

Authors
  1. Zhanggen Guo
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  2. Zhenwen Xu
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  3. Chen Chen
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  4. Bing Zhang
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  5. Dawn E. Lehman
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  6. Shuangyin Cao
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Correspondence to Zhanggen Guo.

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Guo, Z., Xu, Z., Chen, C. et al. Behavior of GFRP retrofitted reinforced concrete slabs subjected to conventional explosive blast. Mater Struct 50, 236 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1617/s11527-017-1107-6

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