Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors

The flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels (PCSP) with pultruded square glass fibre-reinforced polymer (GFRP) tubular shear connectors was examined in this study. Five PCSPs were tested under a static four-point bending load to reveal the influence of the direction...

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Main Authors: Sah, Tilak, Lacey, Andrew, Hao, Hong, Manalo, Allan, Chen, Wensu
Format: Journal Article
Published: Elsevier 2025
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/97886
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author Sah, Tilak
Lacey, Andrew
Hao, Hong
Manalo, Allan
Chen, Wensu
author_facet Sah, Tilak
Lacey, Andrew
Hao, Hong
Manalo, Allan
Chen, Wensu
author_sort Sah, Tilak
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description The flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels (PCSP) with pultruded square glass fibre-reinforced polymer (GFRP) tubular shear connectors was examined in this study. Five PCSPs were tested under a static four-point bending load to reveal the influence of the direction and spacing of shear connectors, and thickness of the insulation layer on their flexural performance. All the tested panels exhibited flexural failure mode caused by vertical cracks on the bottom and top concrete wythes along the length of the panels. In addition to flexural failure, panels with combined tension-compression connectors showed punching failure of the compression connectors through the bottom concrete wythe. A panel with tension connectors showed 43 % and 26 % higher peak load-bearing capacity than the panel with straight and combined tension-compression connectors, respectively. The reduction in the spacing of shear connectors had a negligible influence on the strength of the panel. The cracking and ultimate strengths of the tested panels were theoretically estimated, showing a reasonable match with the experimental results. Moreover, the evaluation of the degree of composite action (DCA) in the panels revealed that the panel with tension connectors can achieve almost full composite action in yield and peak loading stages.
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institution Curtin University Malaysia
institution_category Local University
last_indexed 2025-11-14T11:49:27Z
publishDate 2025
publisher Elsevier
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-978862025-07-22T06:28:16Z Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors Sah, Tilak Lacey, Andrew Hao, Hong Manalo, Allan Chen, Wensu The flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels (PCSP) with pultruded square glass fibre-reinforced polymer (GFRP) tubular shear connectors was examined in this study. Five PCSPs were tested under a static four-point bending load to reveal the influence of the direction and spacing of shear connectors, and thickness of the insulation layer on their flexural performance. All the tested panels exhibited flexural failure mode caused by vertical cracks on the bottom and top concrete wythes along the length of the panels. In addition to flexural failure, panels with combined tension-compression connectors showed punching failure of the compression connectors through the bottom concrete wythe. A panel with tension connectors showed 43 % and 26 % higher peak load-bearing capacity than the panel with straight and combined tension-compression connectors, respectively. The reduction in the spacing of shear connectors had a negligible influence on the strength of the panel. The cracking and ultimate strengths of the tested panels were theoretically estimated, showing a reasonable match with the experimental results. Moreover, the evaluation of the degree of composite action (DCA) in the panels revealed that the panel with tension connectors can achieve almost full composite action in yield and peak loading stages. 2025 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/97886 10.1016/j.istruc.2025.109287 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Elsevier fulltext
spellingShingle Sah, Tilak
Lacey, Andrew
Hao, Hong
Manalo, Allan
Chen, Wensu
Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors
title Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors
title_full Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors
title_fullStr Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors
title_full_unstemmed Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors
title_short Flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square GFRP tubular shear connectors
title_sort flexural performance of composite prefabricated concrete sandwich panels with pultruded square gfrp tubular shear connectors
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/97886