Testing of recycled PET rebar chair

Small chairs for supporting reinforcing steel in concrete slabs were molded from recycled PET. The performance of these chairs was tested relative to plastic chairs available on the market. Four tests were used to evaluate the chairs. The tests were designed to evaluate impact, compression, and UV degradation strengths of the chairs, as well as the adhesion between die PET and concrete. The recycled PET chairs performed better than commercial chairs under compression, but did not allow for flow of the concrete. The impact performance of recycled chairs was very comparable to the commercial chairs. UV results are embedded in the impact and compression tests.