The effects of fire on compressive and tensile strength of natural fiber-reinforced concrete

• Main Authors: Daulo, Dustin Virgil M., Samson, Adonis L., Jr., Sy, Silver, Villanueva, Therence
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2014
• Subjects: Fiber-reinforced concrete; Concrete slabs > Standards; Concrete panels > Standards; Civil Engineering
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_bachelors/10554
• Institution: De La Salle University

The study investigates on natural fiber reinforced concrete (NFRC) and its effects when exposed to fire. Three natural fibers are considered in this study, and these are abaca, coir, and rice husk fibers. Two types of fiber content percentage were used to observe the trend of possible strength increase and reduction due to fire exposure. The optimal values in terms of volume fraction were determined from previous studies for each fiber (0.5 for abaca, 1.0 for coir, 1.5 for rice husk). To evaluate the performance of NFRCs, the performance of plain concrete is used as reference. Compressive strength and splitting tensile strength were determined for the NFRC and plain concrete specimens. Paired-sample T-test statistical analysis was used to determine the significance in terms of increase and reduction in strength of the NFRCs with respect to the plain concrete. The optimal value for abaca fiber displayed the greatest tensile strength before exposure to fire (3.362 MPa). It was then determined that the optimal value for coir fiber displayed the greatest increase in compressive and tensile strength (27.08 MPa and 3.29 MPa, respectively) among the three fibers just before it was exposed to fire. However, it also displayed the greatest decrease in tensile strength after it was exposed to fire. The optimal value for rice husk fiber displayed the greatest decrease in compressive strength after exposure to fire, displaying a 19.65% decrease.