Study of the design and mechanical performance of a GFRP-concrete composite deck

A GFRP-concrete composite bridge deck is presented in this paper. This composite deck is composed of concrete and a GFRP plate and is connected by GFRP perfobond (PBL) shear connectors with penetrating GFRP rebar. There are many outstanding advantages in mechanical behavior, corrosion resistance and durability of this composite deck over conventional reinforced concrete decks. To analyze the shear and flexural performance of this GFRP-concrete composite deck, a static loading experiment was carried out on seven specimens. The failure modes, strain development and ultimate bearing capacity were thoroughly examined. Based on elastic theory and strain-based theory, calculation methods for shear and flexural capacity were put forward and revised. The comparison of tested and theoretical capacity results showed that the proposed methods could effectively predict both the flexural and shear capacity of this composite deck. The ACI 440 methods were relatively conservative in predicting flexural capacity and excessively conservative in predicting shear capacity of this composite deck. The analysis of mechanical behavior and the design method can be used for the design of this composite deck and provides a significant foundation for further research.