Structural Behavior of Ferrocement Concrete Plates Subjected to Flexural and Dynamic Loadings

Ferrocement is one of the structural materials, widely used due to its advantages from its particular behavior such as mechanical properties, and impact strength. This paper deals with the impact studies and energy absorption properties of ferrocement slabs. For these studies, 11 different ferrocement slabs of size 50 mm X 500 mm X 25 mm were cast with alteration in the combinations of mesh layers and test results are analyzed to find the different crack patterns .The test specimens were loaded by 3.10 kg under its height 1.20 m in the center of plates. The ferrocement plates were divided into 4 groups reinforced with steel mesh, steel mesh with steel bars, percentage of rubber and fiber. The impact energy at initial cracking stage and at failure was determined for all the slabs. Results of reinforced ferrocement plates emphasized that increasing the number of the steel mesh layers in the ferrocement forms increases the first cracking load, ultimate load and energy absorption. Using steel bars with steel meshes led to higher energy absorption than that obtained when using mild steel bars only. Using rubber and fiber achieved high impact energy.