Fiber-Reinforced Plastic Jackets for Ductility Enhancement of Reinforced Concrete Bridge Columns with Poor Lap-Splice Detailing

This paper presents an inclusive testing program conducted on scaled models of reinforced concrete (RC) bridge columns with insufficient lap-splice length. Thirteen half-scale circular and square column samples were tested in flexure under lateral cyclic loading. Three columns were tested in the as-built configuration whereas ten samples were tested after being retrofitted with different composite-jacket systems. A brittle failure was observed in the as-built samples due to bond deterioration of the lap-spliced longitudinal reinforcement. The jacketed circular columns demonstrated a significant improvement in their cyclic performance. Yet, tests conducted on square jacketed columns showed a limited improvement in clamping on the lap-splice region and for enhancing the ductility of the column.