Shear Behavior of High Performance Concrete Beams Using Digital Image Correlation Technique

Four-points bending tests were carried out on high performances concrete beams without stirrups and with stirrups, designed to consider shear behavior, and using digital image correlation technique (DIC). In the experimental device, the shear zone between the support and the loading point was digitized by high resolution camera. The numerical analysis of the recorded images is performed by Gom-Aramis software to obtain the deformation of concrete and to monitor the crack evolution in terms of width, spacing and length. The different models to determine the capacity of shear strength of reinforced concrete beams, used by the principal universal design codes such as the American ACI 318, the British Standard 8110, the European Eurocode 2 and the New Zealand NZS 3101, were extrapolated to high performance concrete to evaluate the applicability of these regulations originally developed for the ordinary concrete to the high performance concrete. The experimental results show that all the code models underestimate the shear contribution of high performance concrete and at the same time greatly overestimate the transverse reinforcement contribution. Among the four models, Eurocode 2 yields the best predictions of the ultimate shear strength of high performance concrete.