7 THINGS ABOUT REINFORCED CONCRETE THAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT

7 THINGS ABOUT REINFORCED CONCRETE THAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT

Reinforced concrete is one of the most used building material, where reinforced concrete is strengthened by adding steel bars as reinforcing the material.

Here I shared '7 THINGS ABOUT REINFORCED CONCRETE' that you should know about.

What is Reinforced concrete?

Reinforced concrete is basically a combination of concrete and steel bars(as reinforcing materials).
The basic concept is that the compressive strength of concrete and tensile strength of steel combined and work as a whole unit.

when compressive loads are involved then only yo don't need to provide reinforcement.

But as we know tensile strength of concrete is very low ,thus concrete can fail under tension zone very easily.
Therefore steel is embedded into the concrete so that concrete can take compressive load and tensile load simultaneously.

2.Why steel is the most suitable for Reinforced concrete?

The reasons for choosing steel as a most standard option for RCC is given below-

• Ductility- steel is one of the best example of ductile material,means it can undergo large deformation without causing failure.
• Co-efficient of thermal expansion- Coefficient of thermal expansion of steel and concrete is almost same,thus change in length with respect to temperature is almost same for concrete and steel.This create a strong bond b/w steel and concrete.
• Availability- Steel is easily available because it is globally produced.
• Sustainability- one of the best sustainable building material as it can be recycled again and again.
• Young's modulus- Young's modulus of steel is same for tensions and compression which ensures that the pulling and pushing load will cause same amount of change in length.

3.What are the most common types of reinforcement used in RCC?

• Mild steel
• Deformed steel 

4.Why we provide double Reinforced beam instead of single Reinforced beam?

Well,in case of single reinforced beam you need to provide reinforcement only in the tension zone.

But Sometimes when the depth of beam is restricted,it can be seen that providing reinforcement in tension zone is not sufficient to resist the total bending moment.

Then we provide reinforcement in the compression zone also,which makes itself a double reinforced beam.

5.What are the advantages of Reinforced concrete?

• As it is a combination of both steel and concrete,it has high compressive strength and high tensile strength simultaneously.
• Durable
• long life span
• maintenance cost is low
• Required materials are easily available
• fire and climate resistant 

6.Why a minimum clear-cover is provided in Reinforced concrete?

As per IS456 code,there are some guidelines about minimum clear cover.

It is mainly provided to protect the reinforcement from climate effects.

Also it is required to make Reinforced concrete a fire resistance because we know that steel can cause combust due to high in temperature(fire).

So, if we don't provide a minimum clear cover then it will be easier for steel to combust.

7.What are the alternatives of steel in reinforced concrete?

Steel is the traditional material in reinforced concrete.It is used to prolong the life span of structure and it gives extra safety to the structure.

But we have many possibilities in future that can replace the traditional steel.

The Most important one is Fibre,other one is bamboo.

Some types of fibre that are most trending in current time are given below-

• Carbon fibre
• Asbestos fibre
• Polypropylene fibre
• Natural fibre

But,still there is a limitation behind the uses of fibre as reinforcing material in concrete.

SUMMARY-

Reinforced concrete is one of the most used building material in the world.There are plenty of reasons to use reinforced concrete and very less reasons to avoid it.
And as a reinforcing material steel is the one that may be irreplaceable in future but other possibilities are rising like carbon fibre,bamboo.

Though design process of reinforced concrete is a little complicated,but reinforced concrete is still the first choice for (most of the time) civil engineers.


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