Bond Degradation Mechanism and Constitutive Relationship of Ribbed Steel Bars Embedded in Engineered Cementitious Composites under Cyclic Loading

In order to investigate the bond degradation mechanism and constitutive relationship of ribbed steel bars in engineered cementitious composites (ECCs) under cyclic loading, 12 groups of specimens were tested in this paper. The design parameters included ECC compressive strength, ECC flexural toughness, cover thickness, and anchorage length. The results indicated that the degradation of the bond behavior of the ribbed steel bars in the ECCs under cyclic loading was mainly caused by the degradation of the properties of the ECC material itself, concentrating on the development of cracks in the ECC, the extrusion and shear failure of the ECC between the steel bar ribs, and the continuous grinding of the ECC particles on the shear failure surface. The degradation of the bond stress-slip curves under cyclic loading was mainly reflected by the degradation in the ultimate bond strength and unloading stiffness. According to the monotonic loading test results, a monotonic bond stress-slip relationship model was proposed. On this basis, through building the hysteretic rules of the bond stress-slip curves under cyclic loading, a calculation model was proposed to predict the bond stress-slip constitutive relationship between the ribbed steel bars embedded in the ECCs under cyclic loading. Finally, the validity of the proposed model was verified by a comparison between the model curves and the tested curves.