Flexural toughness and impact resistance of steel-fibre-reinforced lightweight concrete

Abstract

This paper presents the flexural toughness, impact resistance, and other properties such as density, compressive and tensile strength, and modulus of elasticity, of both plain and fibre-reinforced lightweight aggregate concrete. It also discusses the effect of the density of coarse and fine aggregate on the flexural toughness and impact resistance. The impact resistance of the concrete was determined using instrumented drop-weight testing equipment. An expanded clay type of lightweight aggregate and steel fibres were used for the concrete. The compressive strength of the lightweight aggregate concrete ranged from approximately 40 MPa to 80 MPa. The results indicated that high compressive strength and density are desirable for good impact resistance of plain concrete, and the incorporation of the steel fibres improved the impact resistance substantially.