An-Najah Staff

The effect of fire induced restraint and fire scenario on the fire response of reinforced concrete beams is addressed in this paper. ‎A macroscopic finite element model, capable of tracing the behavior of restrained reinforced concrete beams from prefire stage to ‎collapse in fire is used in the analysis. The model is applied to investigate the effect of three parameters; namely, fire scenario, ‎axial restraint effect, and failures criteria on the fire response of reinforced concrete beams. The predicted fire resistance of ‎reinforced concrete beams is compared to those computed as specified in ACI 216.1 and Eurocode 2. Results from the analysis ‎indicate that the fire scenario has significant influence on fire resistance of reinforced concrete beams. The fire resistance of ‎reinforced concrete beams generally increases with the degree of axial restraint. Also, the limiting criteria used to define failure can ‎have significant influence on the resulting fire resistance. These factors, which are not taken into account in conventional ‎prescriptive based approaches, should be given due consideration for realistic assessment of fire resistance of reinforced concrete ‎beams under performance based codes.‎