Flexural Behavior of a Newly Developed No-Damage Reinforced Bamboo Scrimber Beam: Experimental Investigation and Theoretical Analysis

ABSTRACT The flexural failure of bamboo scrimber beams is usually derived from the tensile fracture of bamboo fibers, and the compressive strength of bamboo scrimber cannot be fully used. To investigate the bending properties of hot-pressed bamboo scrimber beams and improve their bearing capacity, a newly developed no-damage reinforced bamboo scrimber beam is proposed, in which steel bars are embedded into bamboo scrimber with an integrated shape. Four-point bending loading tests were carried out on twenty-one reinforced bamboo scrimber beams, and the influences of the reinforcement ratio and reinforcement arrangement on the flexural behavior of bamboo scrimber beams were compared and analyzed. The test results showed that when the reinforcement arrangement was the same, compared with ordinary bamboo scrimber beams, the bearing capacity of single-reinforced beams increased by 13.06 %∼48.13 %, and the bending stiffness increased by 15.66 %∼72.41 % with increasing reinforcement ratio. When the diameter of the reinforcement was the same, the double-reinforced beam had a 28.93 % increase in bearing capacity and a 184.38 % increase in bending stiffness compared with the single-reinforced beam. Moreover, a theoretical analysis of the flexural bearing capacity of the reinforced bamboo scrimber beams was conducted, and a practical calculation model of reinforced bamboo scrimber beams was established based on the tri-linear constitutive model.