Research on Seismic Performance of Self-Compacting Concrete Bridge Columns

Using self-compacting concrete to cast the bridge pier can improve the placeability of the concrete, reduce the labor costs, and achieve convenient green construction. Due to there is relatively lack of the research on mechanical behavior of self-compacting concrete columns and little design criterion or manual can be followed, self-compacting concrete is used less in actual bridge engineering in China. The quasi-static tests of self-compacting concrete bridge columns were performed to study the seismic performance in this paper. Based on practical engineering background, two specimens of concrete bridge column, with self-compacting concrete (SCC) and normally-vibrated concrete (NVC), were conducted in 1:3 scale ratio. The main objective of this research is to evaluate the influences of concrete material on the seismic performance of bridge columns. The failure modes, ultimate strength, hysteresis loops, skeleton curves, ductility and residual displacement of columns are presented and analyzed. The quasi-static test results show that, compared with normally-vibrated concrete column, the displacement ductility and energy dissipation capacity of self-compacting concrete column is insufficient. For the failure mode, plastic hinge is formed at the bottom of normally-vibrated concrete column. The height of plastic region is about 30~50cm for normally-vibrated concrete column. The self-compacting concrete column shows similar damage form; the height of plastic region is about 20cm. Nevertheless, due to poor bonding performance of self-compacting concrete, the stripping between longitudinal reinforcements, stirrups and concrete is discovered.