TY - JOUR
T1 - Flexural response of underwater offshore structural members retrofitted with CFRP wraps and their performance after exposure to real marine conditions
AU - George, Jerin M.
AU - Kimiaei, Mehrdad
AU - Elchalakani, Mohamed
AU - Efthymiou, Mike
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank ICR.IAS Joint Venture for providing composite materials and expert labour for the preparation of the retrofitted specimens presented in the paper. The authors would like to extend their gratitude to Royal Perth Yacht Club (www.rpyc.com.au) for using their marina for the conduct of Real Corrosion tests. The authors would also like to acknowledge the efforts of Master of Professional Engineering (MPE) students in the conduct of the experiments through RiverLab research funds at the University of Western Australia (www.uwa.edu.au/projects/oceanworks-project-pages/riverlab).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Institution of Structural Engineers
PY - 2022/9
Y1 - 2022/9
N2 - Offshore structural members may require retrofitting due to various reasons as they age. This paper investigated strengthening and repairing of offshore steel tubular members of nominal diameter of 100 mm using Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymers (CFRPs) subjected to four-point bending. Underwater retrofitting was compared with conventional in air retrofitting. The effect of the number of layers of retrofit was investigated parametrically for repairing and strengthening applications. Repairing corroded steel tubular members with CFRP was found to be very effective under bending. Strengthening of the steel tubular members also showed significant improvement in performance, but the improvement remained at the same level even when the number of CFRP layers increased. In the second part of the study, the durability of CFRP retrofitted tubular members was examined using ‘Real Corrosion’ test where the retrofitted members were fully submerged in a river (saline water) for a period of one year. While corrosion was observed in the non-retrofitted members, the CFRP layers prevented corrosion of retrofitted specimens. It was observed that the retrofit did not lose any structural integrity due to exposure to marine or underwater conditions for a prolonged period of one year. Lastly, a lower-bound interaction equation was developed for repaired steel tubular members under axial compression and bending.
AB - Offshore structural members may require retrofitting due to various reasons as they age. This paper investigated strengthening and repairing of offshore steel tubular members of nominal diameter of 100 mm using Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymers (CFRPs) subjected to four-point bending. Underwater retrofitting was compared with conventional in air retrofitting. The effect of the number of layers of retrofit was investigated parametrically for repairing and strengthening applications. Repairing corroded steel tubular members with CFRP was found to be very effective under bending. Strengthening of the steel tubular members also showed significant improvement in performance, but the improvement remained at the same level even when the number of CFRP layers increased. In the second part of the study, the durability of CFRP retrofitted tubular members was examined using ‘Real Corrosion’ test where the retrofitted members were fully submerged in a river (saline water) for a period of one year. While corrosion was observed in the non-retrofitted members, the CFRP layers prevented corrosion of retrofitted specimens. It was observed that the retrofit did not lose any structural integrity due to exposure to marine or underwater conditions for a prolonged period of one year. Lastly, a lower-bound interaction equation was developed for repaired steel tubular members under axial compression and bending.
KW - Fibre Reinforced Polymer
KW - Offshore steel structures
KW - Real Corrosion
KW - Repair and strengthening
KW - Underwater
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85134563436&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.istruc.2022.06.075
DO - 10.1016/j.istruc.2022.06.075
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85134563436
SN - 2352-0124
VL - 43
SP - 559
EP - 573
JO - Structures
JF - Structures
ER -
