Abstract As an emerging technology, slurry infiltrated mat concrete (SIMCON) will be used in the near future to repair and

retrofit this nations aging infrastructure. Having both a high strength in compression and in tension, this new material is versatile in application. Various researchers have tried to quantify how much improvement from retrofitting flexural beams with SIMCON is possible with various kinds of retrofit layouts. Their results outline the advantages and disadvantages of each retrofit layout. For example, adding SIMCON on the compression region of a beam would improves the beams moment capacity and ductility but still allowing the tension side to have flexural cracks where exposure to the environment can cause corrosion. Another experiment dealt with the effect of sizes of the beam by testing beams with six different reference dimensions. The results demonstrate how the ratio of moment capacities relates to the ratio of moments of inertia. Furthermore, in the same experiment, broken reference beams were repaired with SIMCON and then retested. To model the retrofit layouts that have not been experimented, a MATLAB program was written to simulate 11 different retrofitted layouts. The results of the simulation further the understanding of how SIMCON can improve a beam depending on how SIMCON is added. Fig. 1, SIMCON: continuous fiber mat.7 Introduction A Type of High-Performance Fiber Reinforced Concrete As American infrastructures continue to age, the construction industry continually searches for newer ways to repair and retrofit cheaply and efficiently. One of the widespread types of necessary repairs is flexural retrofitting. Such repair becomes crucial when a beam becomes unserviceable due to, for example, wide cracks exposed to the environment or fatigue. Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete is a solution to this situation.

Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete (SIMCON) is one of the two commercially available types of High-Performance Fiber Reinforced Concrete (HPFRC); the other type being Slurry Infiltrated Fiber Concrete (SIFCON). HPFRC differs from ordinary fiber reinforced concrete (FRC) mainly because of its higher fiber volume fraction (Vf), which is more effective in improving moment capacity and durability when used in retrofit. While SIFCON has discontinuous hook fibers and a very high fiber volume fraction, SIMCON consists of very long fibers fabricated as a mesh, Fig. 1, where the orientation of the fibers can be accurately controlled. Thus, SIMCON can have a high tensile strength but with a low fiber volume fraction (commonly about 5%), as oppose to SIFCON, which requires a high fiber volume fraction (4-14% for 1-inch-fibers) to achieve the same tensile strength.4 Cost Efficiency Although both types of HPFRCs are effective in improving ductility, strength, energy absorption, crack width, and eliminating the need for stirrups, SIMCON has advantages over SIFCON in economy; the manufacturing and labor costs deter the popularity of SIFCON. Existing machines can manufacture SIMCON. Furthermore, SIMCON are shipped out in large rolls, which can easily unravel to cover the subject beam or column, simplifying the construction work. The construction procedures for repair work with SIMCON are very similar to that of regular concrete, thus working with SIMCON requires minimal retraining.4 Uses of SIMCON The experiment by Dogon, Krstulovic-Opara, Uang, and Haghayeghi investigates the effects of different placements of SIMCON on retrofitted beams. It involved testing two reference reinforced concrete beams with no SIMCON addition and six retrofitted beams with three types of layout: having SIMCON on the top only, on the bottom only, and on three sides (two sides and bottom of the beam). The six variable beams behaved differently, suggesting that the different layouts do not improve the performance of the beam in the same way. The later experiment by Haghayeghi and Oluokun aimed to quantify how much the performance of a retrofitted beam improves depending on the size of the subject beam. Lastly, untested retrofit layouts are simulated to further the understanding of the layouts effects. Slurry Mix While the steel mat in SIMCON provides the tensile strength, the cement-based slurry

mix provides most of the compressive strength. An example of SIMCON slurry mix is 1/0.31/0.6/0.3/0.045 by weight of Type I Portland cement, water, Ottawa silica sand #250, microsilica, and superplasticizer, respectively.4 The mix does not have any coarse aggregates because bigger rocks cannot fit through the small spaces between the steel fibers. Only fine aggregates can effectively bond with the mesh of thin fibers. Microsilica sand is added to further fill in the microscopic pores between the fine aggregates, therefore enhancing the compressive strength of SIMCON. Ultimately, the superplasticizer facilitates pumping this slurry mix into the formwork by allowing the aggregates and cement to flow more thoroughly into the entire steel mat. Retrofit Layouts The decision on which sides of a beam to retrofit with SIMCON affects which properties of the beam would improve. Adding SIMCON to every face of the beam would enhance nearly every property of the beam, although at a high cost. If a budget can only allow adding SIMCON to one side of the beam, the engineer has to consider which properties of the beam are worth improving. In an experiment by Krstulovic-Opara, Dogon, Uang, and Haghayeghi,4 six beams with three distinct layouts of SIMCON retrofit were tested against two reference beams, as illustrated in Fig 2. The three layouts included placement of 1-inch-thick SIMCON on the top, on the bottom, and on the two sides and bottom (U-Jacket) of the beam. The reference beams were 6 inches by 6 inches beams with steel reinforcement on the bottom and on the top of the beam.

Fig. 2, Reference beam and retrofitted beam layouts; units are in centimeters.4 Stirrups were placed near the supports to resist shear. The six variable beams with SIMCON retrofit were simply reference beams with SIMCON additions. The beams were then loaded at 0.0336 inches per minute until flexural failure. Every

beam followed ACI 318-89 in order to produce a ductile flexural failure.4 The average tensile strength of SIMCON was 23 ksi at 1.1% strain.4 Each layout of the SIMCON retrofitted beam did not behave in the same fashion. The beams with SIMCON on the top only and on the bottom only behaved similarly until the first steel yield point; both had the same number of major cracks and the same pattern of flexural crack pattern. Nearing the ultimate moment capacity, the top-only beam had flexural cracks that propagated very close to the top surface, meaning that the SIMCON layer on the top significantly improved the compressive strength of the beam. The bottom-only beam, however, did not have such prominent flexural crack propagationsthe bottom SIMCON layer effectively slows down the initialization of the flexural cracks. Except for the delamination of the SIMCON layer and the critical crack, the bottom-only beam had only very fine, discontinuous flexural cracks. The U-jacket layout outperformed the top-only and bottom-only layout in terms of maximum moment and adherence; the SIMCON layer of U-jacket layout beams did not delaminate like the other two retrofitted beam layouts.4 The U-jacket doubled the maximum moment of the reference beam, significantly higher than the other layouts, as shown in Table 1 and Fig. 3. Table 1, Experimental values of moment and curvature.4

Beam type Reference beams Bottom-only layout Top-only layout "U-jacket" layout

First crack Moment, kip-in. Curvature, e-5 in.^-1 25 4.47 90 19.8 54 5.69 107 16.3

Maximum moment Moment, kip-in. Curvature, e-5 in.^-1 143 254 183 76.2 196.4 279 312 317

The experiments and modeling by Krstulovic-Opara et al.4 demonstrate the following relationships between SIMCON layout and effects on the beam: Lever arm: all three layouts lengthened the lever arms and therefore the maximum moment capacity. Delamination: although the top-only and bottom-only layouts exhibited detached SIMCON layers before or after the maximum moment, this problem can be avoided by installing shear studs or shear keys between reinforced concrete and SIMCON.

Crack initialization: SIMCON exhibits multiple cracks mechanism in flexural load, which means, except for the large critical crack, it would have only microscopic, discontinuous cracks. Consequently, the bottom-only layout and the U-jacket layout had very few and very small flexural cracks (which also propagated upward very slowly), compared to the toponly layout, as shown in Fig. 4. Crack propagation: if a beams tension region is retrofitted with SIMCON, the upward propagation of flexural cracks is impeded with the SIMCONs high elastic modulus, compared to the steel reinforcement, which is related to its

Fig. 3, Moment-curvature behavior of tested beams; solid lines represent the experimental results; dashed lines represent the analytical models.4

multiple cracks mechanism. Such retrofit layout would actually have a lower ductility factor compared to the top-only beam. When a beams compression region is retrofitted instead, flexural cracks are allowed to travel very far up the beams height, almost to the very top, due to the SIMCON strengthening the compressive side, which is also shown in Fig 4. Durability: ACI specifies that continuous cracks must be below 0.0078 in. to be safe from the environment. Fortunately, SIMCON flexural cracks, aside from the critical crack, are at most 0.0039 inch. (These cracks are also discontinuous, whereas the ACI code refers to continuous cracks.) Furthermore, due to SIMCONs low water content, SIMCON has a higher percentage of unhydrated cement particles than regular concrete. Such condition allows the SIMCONs permeability to decrease gradually due to autogenous healing (a process where moisture converts cements calcium hydroxide into limestone, sealing the

cracks 8). Therefore, if corrosion is an important factor, the engineer must retrofit the beams tensile region with SIMCON. Fig 4, Top: the top-only layout allowed the flexural cracks to propagate up very close to the top surface due to the SIMCON layer strengthening the compression region. Bottom: the bottom SIMCON slowed the flexural crack initialization and the upward propagation of cracks; notice that the only major crack on the SIMCON is the critical fracture.4

Beam Size Effect The magnitude of improvement from a retrofit is correlated with the size of the subject beam. In the experiment conducted by Krstulovic-Opara et al. in 1997,4 the two reference beams had the same dimensions, while every layout of SIMCON had a thickness of 1 inch. Two years later, Oluokun and Haghayeghi6 conducted another experiment with SIMCON-retrofitted beams with a scope that included beams of different sizes. The specimens included 12 reference reinforced concrete beams with six different sizes and 12 corresponding retrofitted beams, as illustrated in Fig. 5. Every retrofitted beam had a Ujacket layout of 1-inch thick layer of SIMCON on the bottom and on the sides. Beam 1, 2, and 3 were 6-inches wide, while beam 4, 5, and 6 were 8-inches wide. The reference beams were designed to have ductile flexural failure, ACI 318-95.6

Fig. 5, Top: cross-sections of reference beams. Bottom: cross-sections of retrofitted beams.6 The slurry mix and concrete were designed to have compressive strength of 10 ksi and 6 ksi, respectively. The fiber volume fraction was 5.39%.6 The beams were loaded at two points, approximately at every third of the beam length on a Material Testing System machine. Three linear voltage differentials transducers (LVDT) were placed at the Fig. 6, Moment-curvature response of reference and retrofitted beam 1.6 midspan to measure displacement and curvature.

Every retrofitted beam displayed a pseudoductile response: after the SIMCON fractured, the load capacity dropped because the bottom steel reinforcements were then carrying substantially more load. Every retrofitted beam also failed in the same manner: after the SIMCON fractured, the concrete at the top was crushed as the critical fracture from the SIMCON propagated upward.6 The moment-curvature plot shows significant improvement in moment capacities but not for ductility, as shown in Fig. 6. The differences in improvement from retrofitting between the beam sizes were not large. However, they demonstrated a strong correlation between capacities and dimensions; the ratio of moment capacity of retrofitted beam to that of reference beams is almost linearly related to the

ratio of moment of inertia of the retrofitted beam to that of the reference beam,6 as seen in Table 2. The following equation represents this relationship:

(1) Table 2, Average increase in moment capacity of retrofitted beams with respect to the moment capacity of reference beams.6

A higher ratio of the area of SIMCON and the area of reference beams strongly correlated with a higher increase in moment capacity. For example, retrofitted beam 1 consisted of 33% SIMCON compared to retrofitted beam 4, which is 26% SIMCON. However, if the SIMCON layer thickens by 1 inch to 2 inches thick, beam 1s moment capacity increased by 69% and beam 4s capacity increased only by 20% compared to the original 1-inch-thick SIMCON retrofitted beams.6 Reference beam 1 and beam 4 had the same height only their widths were different, by 2 inches. Therefore, to achieve the substantial magnitude of moment capacity improvement, beams with larger areas need thicker layers of SIMCON on the tensile side. The 12 reference beams were tested 4 weeks after casting. However, the 12 retrofitted beams were tested 9 weeks after casting and 30 days after the addition of SIMCON.6 The long time span between the tests of the reference beams and the retrofitted beam might have influenced the conclusions. However, such procedures were necessary because four of the broken reference beams needed to be repaired and then tested at the same time as the retrofitted beams. Casting more reference beams and retrofitted beams for comparison with the repaired beams may have posed a budget and time issue. Repairing with SIMCON 8

After the reference beam 2 and 5 were tested, Oluokun and Haghayeghi6 repaired those four broken beams with the same processes used in retrofitting beams (after all of the crushed concrete was thoroughly removed.) The original steel reinforcements were not replaced. All of the crushed portions of concrete were replaced with the slurry mix when the mix was pumped into the SIMCON wooden formwork. Oluokun and Hagayeghi6 believed that the slurry mix infiltrated most of the cracks, which was highly plausible due to the slurry mixs high content of fine aggregates and superplasticizers. When tested, the four repaired beams failed in the same manner as the retrofitted beams: SIMCON fractured, allowing the critical crack to propagate upward until the top concrete crushed. The improvements in moment capacity and ductility factor were comparable to the improvements observed in the retrofitted beams,6 as shown in Fig. 7. In fact, the ductility factor for the repaired beam 5 was even higher than that of the retrofitted beam 5, as shown in Table 3. Whether or not the repaired beams superior ductility factor is consistent with other beam repaired with SIMCON, more experiments need to be performed on beams repaired with SIMCON. Nonetheless, the performance of the repaired beams proved that SIMCON is a reliable material for repairing concrete beams. Fig. 7, Moment-curvature response of the repaired beam 5 compared with its reference beams.6

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Table 3, Comparison between the ductility factors of reference, retrofitted, and repaired beams.6

Analytical Modeling: Moment Curvature The experiments by Krstulovic-Opara et al.4 and Oluokun and Haghayeghi6 covered the scope of the different retrofit layouts, the effects of beam size, and the performance of repaired beams. There are still some retrofit layouts that were not addressed. With limited time and resource, the best course of action is to model the other layouts. General Procedures Since reinforced concrete and SIMCON are nonlinear materials, a numerical nonlinear analysis model is well suited for simulating a reinforced-concrete-SIMCON composite beam. Haghayeghi and Oluokun2 used a numerical procedure similar to the nonlinear analysis of concrete beams and columns, as laid out in Fig 8., which involves discretizing the cross section area of the beam into slices and then calculating the stresses in each layer for the corresponding materials by assuming linear strain distribution along the height of the beam. The first step is to input section geometry Fig. 8, Flow chart of computation procedure.
2

and properties.2 They include the width, height,

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thickness of SIMCON and concrete and the location, amount, and bar size of longitudinal steel reinforcements and stirrups. Furthermore, the program also requires the maximum strength of concrete and the grade of steel. The second step is the discretization of the cross section area into thin layers.2 The recommended number of layers is 100. However, for an extremely large section, it is important to make sure that a layer is smaller than roughly a third of the longitudinal steel reinforcements diameter. Each layer is then divided into areas of every material in the beam. The next step begins the iterative loop to find points on the moment-curvature plot. The procedures described here do not always conform to the cited literature because the procedures have been modified for accuracy and speed. The bisection method is used to find the correct bottom strain, bot, corresponding to a given top strain.1 The program begins with setting the topmost strain, top to a small value, e.g. d = 10-5. The bisection method procedure then begins to find the correct bot by first guessing that bot1 is zero and bot2 is the steel fracture strain, sm. (Assuming that there is no axial force at the neutral axis, the error of guessing the first top being less than axial is not possible.) The average of bot1 and bot2 is the estimated bottom strain, bot,est. For every bot,est, the material model provides the stress each material in each layer. To determine whether bot,est is correct, we find the resulting force by taking the sum of the multiplication of every layer area and its corresponding stress to determine whether the beam is in equilibrium. If not, we produce a new bot,est by setting the new bot1 or bot2 (new bot1 if there is too much tension) as the previous bot,est and calculate for the stresses and the resulting force again.1 Repeat until the resulting force is within a set acceptable range, i.e., less than 0.01. After equilibrium is achieved, we calculate for the moment and curvature, and record any other important properties, such as the correct bot and the neutral axis. This step would produce a point on the moment-curvature plot. To calculate for more points, we continually increase top by d increments and then calculate the corresponding moment and curvature for each increment. The final top should be reasonably past the concrete crushing strain in order to observe the starting point of the moment-curvature plots descending branch. The compressive and tensile models of SIMCON were derived from known fiber reinforced concrete models by modifying the coefficients, which were determined experimentally from tests done on both SIFCON and SIMCON.2

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Modeling SIMCON Both compressive and tensile behaviors of SIMCON are divided into two parts: the ascending branch and the descending branch.3 The ascending branch is when the stress increases with strain. The descending branch is the stress after the ultimate stress, cu, is already reached. When SIMCON is undergoing compression or tension, the ultimate stress and the corresponding strain are calculated with the following equation5:

(2)

(3) where vmu and vmu are the virtual compressive strength and the corresponding strain when Vf = 0, and are an experimentally determined coefficients. These four components and cu and cu are tabulated5, 3 in Tables 4 and 5. These values in compression are not the same as those in tension. For compression, some specific values are dependent on how the slurry mix was applied.5 Table 4, Specific values for modeling SIMCON in compression.5

Table 5, Specific values for modeling SIMCON in tension.3

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In compression and tension, the behavior of SIMCON follows the stress-strain relationship until the stress reaches the ultimate strength this is the ascending branch.5, 3 The stress-strain relationship is as follows,5, 3

for

(4)

where and Ec is the elastic modulus.

(5)

Beyond the respective ultimate stress, in the descending branch, SIMCON in compression is still correlated to the strain, but with a new relationship as follows5 for (6)

where asy is the asymptotic stress on the stress-strain relation curve, which was determined experimentally (and tabulated). The m and b are coefficients related to the stress and strain at the point of inflection on the stress-strain curve,5 see the Appendix for their codes. The descending branch of SIMCON in tension is related to the opening of cracks, which is as follows,3

for

(7)

where

(8)

is an experimentally determined coefficient and is the width of the cracks opening. According to Krstulovic-Opara and Malak,3 can be approximated to be 0.5*d (d = width of a fiber strand) in order to produce good prediction modeling; L/d is a commonly used quantity in FRC.4 SIMCON Models in Simulation To build upon the experiments Krstulovic-Opara et al. and Oluokun et al., I have used MATLAB to analytically model retrofitted beams of different cross-section layouts. The reference beam, as shown in Fig. 9, is modeled after the beam 1 in the experiment of Oluokun et

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al. The 11 retrofitted beams layouts are shown in Fig. 10. The MATLAB code is located in the Appendix. Results After forming the moment-curvature plot for the 12 beams, the plot of beams with similar layouts are shown together in one graph in order to compare how slight changes in the placement of SIMCON can change the properties of the beam. The first comparisons involves the top-only Fig. 9, Cross-section of the reference beam. and bottom-only retrofitted beams and how thickening the SIMCON layer from 1 inch to 2 inches affects and properties. Both top-only layouts doubled the reference beams ductility ratio and increased moment capacity by about 25% and 50%, as illustrated in Fig. 11. However, retrofitting on the tension side only does not improve the ductility factor or the moment capacity significantly (only by about 10-20%), as shown in Fig. 12. Therefore, for this particular reference beam, if retrofitting is limited to only one side, retrofitting the compression would improve the moment capacity and ductility factor more substantially.

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For the beam retrofitted on the top and bottom, ductility factor improved by about 300%

Fig. 10, Modeled retrofit layouts. or more, as shown in Fig 13. The most outstanding out of the three beams in this category is beam 4.2, which has about a ductility factor of about five times greater than that of the reference beam and a moment capacity that is about twice as muchthe biggest improvement in moment capacity out of all the beams. The U-jacket and full-jacket layouts do not perform as well as the top-and-bottom layouts given the same or greater amount of SIMCON, as shown in Fig. 14. However, beam 6.0 improves the ductility factor by the most out of every retrofitted beam. These beams did not improve the moment capacity as much as the augmented top-and-bottom layouts because their SIMCON are not localized at the top or bottom, thus not effectively lengthening the lever arm.

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Fig. 11, Moment-curvature response of the top-only retrofitted beam layouts. The reference beams curve is the bottommost curve.

Fig. 12, Moment-curvature response of the bottom-only and sides-only retrofitted beam layouts. The reference beams curve is the bottommost curve.

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Fig. 13, Moment-curvature response of the top-andbottom retrofitted beam layouts. The reference beams curve is the bottommost curve.

Fig. 14, Moment-curvature response of the U-jacket and full-jacket retrofitted beam layouts. The reference beams curve is the bottommost curvet.

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Fig. 15, Moment-curvature response of every modeled beam.

Conclusions The conducted experiments and simulations demonstrate that slurry infiltrated mat concrete has a lot of potential as a material for retrofitting. The experiment by Krstulovic-Opara et al. not only demonstrated how SIMCON improves moment capacity and ductility factor, but it also showed the advantages of retrofitting with SIMCON, such as corrosion prevention. The simulation shows that there are many effective ways to retrofit with SIMCON, whether it be enlarging the lever arm or improving energy absorption. A material that has the compressive behavior similar to concrete and yet can bear more than 10 ksi in tension has a versatility similar to kind that brought structural steel into widespread popularity. Perhaps in the near future SIMCON would used extensively in construction as well. Beam made out of HPFRC like SIMCON and SIFCON can be smaller in dimensions compared to the traditional reinforced concrete beams with the same capacity.4 With a better understanding of how reinforced-concrete-SIMCON composite beams work, engineers will be able to make smarter decisions.

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References 1. 2. Chai, Rob Y. H. Confined Concrete. ECI 232: Advanced Topics in Concrete Structures. University of California, Davis. 26-31 Oct. 2011. Lecture. Haghayeghi, Abdol R., and Ajiboye F. Oluokun. Prediction of Flexural Strength of Concrete Beams Retrofitted with Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete (SIMCON). American Concrete Institute: Structural Journal 95-S50 (1998): 558-569. Krstulovic-Opara, Nevin, and Sary Malak. Tensile Behavior of Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete (SIMCON). American Concrete Institute: Materials Journal 94-M5 (1997): 39-46. Krstulovic-Opara, Neven, Erdem Dogon, Chia-Ming Uang, and Abdol R. Haghayeghi. Flexual Behavior of Composite R.C.-Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete (SIMCON) Members. American Concrete Institute: Structural Journal 94-S46 (1997): 502512. Krstulovic-Opara, Neven, and Mohammad Jamal Al-Shannag. Compressive Behavior of Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete. American Concrete Institute: Materials Journal 96-M46 (1999): 367-377. Oluokun, Ajiboye F., and Abdol R. Haghayeghi. Flexural Behavior of Concrete Beams Retrofitted or Repaired with Slurry Infiltrated Mat Concrete (SIMCON). American Concrete Institute: Structural Journal 95-S59 (1998): 654-664. SIMCON: Continuous fiber-mat High-Performance Fiber Reinforced Cementitious Composites. Photo. Emerging Construction Technologies. 2011. 22 Nov. 2011 <http://rebar.ecn.purdue.edu/ect/links/technologies/civil/simcon.aspx>. What is Autogenous Healing. Cement Lining Corporation International. 2011. 22 Nov. 2011 <http://www.cementlining.com/clci/faqs.htm#faq4>.

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Appendices

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