Fatigue-loading effect on RC beams strengthened with externally bonded FRP

External bonding of fiber-reinforced polymers (FRP) on concrete beams is particularly attractive for the strengthening of civil engineering structures in order to increase their strength and stiffness. Principles for design of such strengthening methods are now established and many guidelines exist. However, fatigue design procedure is still an ongoing research topic. This paper focuses on the damage behavior of FRP-strengthened reinforced concrete (RC) structures subjected to fatigue loading. In order to design bonded reinforcements, an iterative computational method based on section equilibrium and material properties (concrete, steel, adhesive and composite) has been previously developed by authors [1-3]. In the present study, this method is extended to describe the fatigue behavior of RC beams. A specific modeling coupled with an experimental investigation on large-scale beams made it possible to compare the theoretical and experimental fatigue behaviors of RC beams with and without composite reinforcements. The model is developed and calibrated using data of the literature or recorded during experiments specifically carried out for this study. Results showed that the beam deflection and the strain in each material could be calculated with a sufficient accuracy, so that the fatigue behavior of the FRP-strengthened beams was correctly estimated by the model. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.