Emergency Retrofit for Damaged RC Columns by Fiber Belts Prestressing and Plywoods

After a strong earthquake attacks to a building, damaged structural members such as columns should have sufficient vertical resistance to sustain gravity loads to rescue residents or move equipments. The rehabilitation of a damaged building is called "Emergency Seismic Retrofit" hereafter. Previous experimental investigations have demonstrated by utilizing high-strength steel bar prestressing or aramid fiber belt prestressing, seismic performances of shear-damaged RC columns significantly improved. In following the previous investigations on emergency seismic retrofit of shear-damaged RC columns, in this study a new approach is proposed regarding economic consideration and easy operation. In this method the polypropylene belts are used instead of aramid fiber belts, plywoods instead of steel plates, and customarily-fabricated ratchet buckles instead of specially-fabricated couplers. Experimental results exhibited efficiency of the pro-posed approach for emergency seismic retrofit of shear-damaged RC columns.