The behavior of lightly reinforced concrete elements under eccentric compression is a complex phenomenon due to material and geometric nonlinearities. This is a field where complete experimental results are lacking. Thus a need was felt to carry out an experimental…
The behavior of lightly reinforced concrete elements under eccentric compression is a complex phenomenon due to material and geometric nonlinearities. This is a field where complete experimental results are lacking. Thus a need was felt to carry out an experimental campaign to investigate the sensitivity of the related parameters on the failure of these type of elements. In this current work, 54 micro-concrete specimens were tested to study the influence of reinforcement amount, slenderness ratio and load eccentricity. The applied load and the displacement at mid- span of the specimen (additional eccentricity) were measured during the entire loading process, including the post-peak stage. At the same time, independent tests were carried out for material characterization. Based on this study, a brittle-ductile classification according to the slenderness ratio andtheeccentricity is performed. Such a classification is particularly useful for the element design to avoid brittle failure.