Enhancing the Thermal Performance of Epoxy Adhesive used in the CFRP/Concrete Bond

Abstract

Epoxy adhesive used as the bonding agent in the Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer/concrete bond shows poor thermal performance. Therefore, this experimental study focused on modifying the epoxy adhesive by blending recycled Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) fibres to enhance thermal performance. The single-lap shear test was conducted by varying the fibre content in the epoxy adhesive to determine the optimum PET fibre to develop the modified epoxy adhesive. The optimum PET fibre content was selected as 30% of the volume of epoxy. The modified adhesive showed a successful bond strength enhancement in both ambient and elevated temperature conditions when compared to the pure epoxy adhesive. The mechanical properties were tested for the developed epoxy-based adhesive. The modified epoxy adhesive achieved an average bond strength of 827.31 MPa (at 30 °C) for 150 mm bond length. Although the glass transition temperature of pure epoxy was between 60 °C and 80 °C, it was between 120°C and 150 °C for the modified epoxy adhesive.