Characterization of GFRP pultruded box beams under static and fatigue loads

This paper describes the performance of closed glassfiber reinforced plastic (GFRP) box beams under cyclic bending loads. Eighteen tests were conducted to monitor the stiffness degradation and failure patterns. Excellent correlation between the theory (developed at West Virginia University) and the experimental static results was observed. Test results showed that shear and interfacial slip between adjacent layers have a significant influence on deflection and strain measurements, respectively. Therefore, the need to properly account for these factors in the theory is emphasized in this paper. Development of an analytical model for fatigue was not possible at this stage of the research program