Micromechanics-Based Fiber-Bridging Analysis of Strain-Hardening Cementitious Composite Accounting for Fiber Distribution

Abstract

In the present work, a micromechanics-based fiber-bridging constitutive model that quantitatively takes into consideration the distribution of fiber orientation and the number of fibers, is derived and a fiber-bridging analysis program is developed. An image processing technique is applied to evaluate the fiber distribution characteristics of four different types of strain-hardening cementitious composites. Then, the fiber-bridging curves obtained from image analysis are compared with those obtained from the assumption of two- and three-dimensional fiber distributions. The calculated ultimate tensile strains are also compared with experimental results. Test results showed that the tensile behavior of strain-hardening cementitious composites can be more accurately predicted and analyzed using the fiber-bridging curve obtained from image analysis.