FLEXURAL BEHAVIOUR OF PRESTRESSED HOLLOW SLAB

Precast construction techniques have gained huge popularity in the recent times due to rapid construction, excellent quality control, lesser site labour costs and more overall savings. In the current scenario, the most advanced type of prestressed construction is the manufacture of prestressed hollow core slab construction, which essentially consists of huge prestressed concrete panel units cast to the required slab dimensions. The construction is associated with the requirement of huge machinery for transportation, hoisting and placing operations. In the present study, a partially prestressed slab of dimensions 4000 mm × 600 mm × 120 mm was designed and cast. An RCC slab was also designed for comparing the behaviour of the prestressed hollow slab. The present study discussed about the flexural behaviour of pretensioned prestressed concrete hollow slab. The slab which was designed for this study consisted of three hollow cores, each having a diameter of three centimeters. A special mould was designed for casting, which was capable of withstanding huge prestressing forces. The hollow core provided within the specimen is an excellent method to improve material savings, thermal and sound insulation properties, besides being a provision for mechanical runs. The slab was cast and experimentally tested by subjecting it to uniformly distributed loads using sand bags to study the flexural behaviour of the slab