Analyzing the sample geometry effect on mechanical performance of drilled GFRP connections

Abstract

A considerable effort to understand the bolted joints’ mechanical behavior in pultruded profiles has existed in the literature over the past decades. However, most investigations focused on the single-bolt connections, and only a few works considered single-lap joints. This paper investigates the mechanical performance of a single-lap connection of pultruded glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP) plates owning to the experimental data deficit in the literature. Tensile tests of specimens with different geometries generate a database comprising 80 single-bolt joints. The shear-out failure was predominant for the considered GFRP pultruded plates, with the end length mainly affecting the load-bearing capacity. Hart-Smith’s theoretical model overestimated the ultimate resistance of all considered joints—the exceptionally low efficiency of the GFRP composite points out the necessity of additional means for strengthening the drilled connections. Additionally, finite element (FE) software ABAQUS simulated the bolted joints; this study employs the user-defined subroutine experimentally verified in the literature. In the considered examples, the ultimate resistance prediction error decreased from 25.7% to 2.9% with increasing the plate thickness (from 4 mm to 8 mm) and width (from 25 mm to 35 mm), which proves the reasonable adequacy of the simplified FE model and makes it a valuable reference for further bolted joints’ development.