Low-cycle fatigue behaviour of ribbed 1.4362 duplex stainless steel reinforcement

To investigate the fatigue behaviour of stainless steel (SS) reinforcement, monotonic tensile and cyclic fatigue loading tests on 1.4362 duplex SS bars with diameters of 12 mm, 16 mm, and 20 mm are conducted. To keep the characteristics of reinforcement used in engineering construction, the specimens remain unprocessed. Two loading schemes for cyclic tests are considered in this work: (i) constant strain-amplitude, and (ii) variable strain-amplitude. The Ramberg-Osgood model was used to fit the experimental results. The strain-based and energy-based fatigue life equations are obtained. The strain-based fatigue life equation is compared with the present fatigue life estimation equations. Moreover, the ReinforcingSteel material model in OpenSees is calibrated with the experimental data. The results show that SS bars under cyclic experience hardening followed by softening. The bar diameter does not significantly affect the fatigue life prediction. The modified fatigue life equation suggests that SS bars have better fatigue resistance than conventional steel (CS) bars. The numerical analysis indicates that the calibrated steel material model (i.e. ReinforcingSteel) can produce a good simulation of SS bars under cyclic loading. It can improve the accuracy of numerical models of concrete components reinforced by SS bars.