The results of an experimental program conducted on seventeen simply supported concrete beams to study the effect of transverse reinforcement on the behavior of the lap splice of a steel reinforcement in tension zones in high-strength concrete beams are presented. The parameters included in the experimental program were the concrete compressive strength, the lap splice length, the amount of transverse reinforcement provided within the splice region, and the shape of the transverse reinforcement around the spliced bars. The experimental results showed that the displacement ductility increased and the mode of failure changed from a splitting bond failure to a flexural failure when the amount of the transverse reinforcement in the splice region increased, and the compressive strength increased up to 100 MPa. The presence of the transverse reinforcement around the spliced bars had a pronounced effect on increasing the ultimate load, the ultimate deflection, and the displacement ductility. The prediction of maximum steel stresses for spliced bars using the ACI 318-05 building code was compared with the experimental results. The comparison showed that the effect of the transverse reinforcement around spliced bars has to be considered into the design equations for lap splice length in high strength concrete beams. |
