Abstract

The use of Near Surface Mounted (NSM) strengthening technique to retrofit reinforced concrete (RC) members using Fiber Reinforced Polymer (FRP) rods has been increasing more and more in recent years, as the engineers have become more familiar with the appealing attributes of FRP. A critical point of the NSM technique is the bond behavior, since the most typical failure modes are due to the loss of the bond either within the adhesive layer or at the FRP bar/adhesive or adhesive/concrete interfaces and, therefore, the ultimate capacity of the reinforced elements will depend on the bond behavior. To address and analyze the influence of the most critical parameters, test series should be conducted. In addition, a closer examination of the open literature shows that there is limited work on the effect of FRP rods as a negative moment region flexural strengthening on the RC T-beams. Thus, in order to bridge the knowledge gap, it is important to continue the research into experimental test and accurate numerical modeling so that engineers and the scientific community have access to a better understanding on the bond performance of FRP rod embedded in concrete with various depth well as the response of RC T-beams strengthened in the negative moment region with NSM FRP rods and sheets subjected to monotonic and cyclic loading.