Study of the Tensile Properties of CFRP Strengthened Steel Plates

This paper presents the experimental results of steel plates strengthened with carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) sheets under tensile load. The number of CFRP layers (ranging from one to four), strengthening schemes (single-sided and double-sided bonding), and temperatures (ranging from 25 to 120 degrees C) were investigated. Results showed that the number of CFRP layers and strengthening schemes had insignificant effects on failure modes of specimens. The failure modes were dominated by the degradation of resin matrix at temperatures lower than T-g + 10 or 20 degrees C, where T-g is the glass transition temperature, and were dominated by the volume decrease of resin matrix at temperatures above that. Through bonding CFRP sheets, the ultimate load and post-elastic stiffness of specimens were significantly increased. However, the increase in the number of CFRP layers also led to the decrease in strengthening and stiffening efficiency. The double-sided strengthened specimens showed more preferable mechanical properties than the single-sided strengthened specimens. As temperature increased, significant decreases in ultimate load and post-elastic stiffness were observed. Analytical modeling to predict the mechanical properties at ambient and elevated temperatures were conducted, respectively. The modeling results were verified by the test data.