Application of high performance concretes to prestressed components for buildings

Abstract

The industrial manufacturing of concrete components prestressed by bonded wires, used in building, quickly advances towards an important use of high perofrmances concretes. For the floorbeam, the use of HPC along with a wire of improved characteristics allows a reduction of the sections while still keeping the performances in bending and in shearing strength. This leads us to saving in the floorbeam weight and also to an important improbement of the productivity. On the other hand, at an identical section, the HOC allows an increase in the performances of the floorbeam without propping as well as of flooring to shearing effort. For the floorbeams, the use of the high resistance in compression allows a redution of the manufacturing shifts and an increase in the performances of the achieved floor. For the beams of important section, the use of the HPC is only interesting if the cast in situ concrete is also a high performances concrete. As a result, among all the possibilities of use of the HPC, the prestressed concrete components, thanks to this technique, have numerous uses.