Experimental Study on the Effectiveness of Ferrocement as a Permanent Form Work for Beams

Ferrocement is a thin composite material made with a cement based mortar matrix reinforced with closely spaced layers of relatively small diameter wire mesh. The experimental study comprised of testing of three control beam specimens of dimension (200 X 300 x 1000) mm and three beam specimens with 25 mm thick ferrocement form work. The control beams were reinforced with two numbers of 10 mm diameter bars and two numbers of 6 mm diameter bars on top and bottom with 6 mm diameter two legged stirrups at 200 mm c/c. The form work consisted of a skeletal reinforcement of 6 mm diameter bar which provide shape and support for the mesh and one layer of chicken mesh having 0.88 mm diameter. The beams with ferrocement form work were reinforced with two numbers of 10 mm diameter bar on top and bottom and were tied at the ends with 6 mm diameter stirrups. The effectiveness of ferrocement as a permanent form work for beams was investigated in this study. The test results showed that the use of ferrocement form work improve the load carrying capacity and crack resistance of the beams.