FE analysis of reinforced concrete corbels with enhanced continuum models

The paper presents quasi-static FE-simulations of the behaviour of short reinforced concrete corbels with and without shear reinforcement. Concrete was modelled with the aid of three various constitutive continuum models: an isotropic elasto-plastic, an isotropic damage and an anisotropic smeared crack approach. To ensure the mesh-independent numerical results and to describe strain localization, a characteristic length of micro-structure was introduced by means of a non-local theory. To simulate the behaviour of reinforcement, an associated elasto-plastic constitutive model with isotropic hardening was assumed. The effects of a characteristic length, bond between concrete and reinforcement, tensile and compressive fracture energy and shear reinforcement on strain localization were carefully investigated. The numerical results were compared with corresponding laboratory tests.