An experimental study on the behaviour of GFRP pultruded I beam reinforced with CFRP laminates

Glass fibre reinforced polymers (GFRP) pultruded profiles are being widely used as a structural material in the construction industry, particularly in a corrosive environment as an alternative material for steel. Despite its many advantages, their design is limited by deformation in service limit states and by local and global buckling in ultimate limit states. To overcome these limitations, they can be reinforced with carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) laminates. In this exploration, the structural behaviour of GFRP pultruded profiles reinforced with CFRP laminates on the flanges has been observed. The mechanical properties are obtained from the specimen extracted from the flanges. Tests of three-point and four-points twisting have been conducted with different layup sequence of CFRP laminates, on full-scale models. A comparative study is made with experimental and analytical results.