The FRP materials and their adhesively bonded joints to steel plates are vulnerable to harsh environments. So far, various researches have been studied on the effect of humid environments but the impact of acidic ones needs to be investigated. In the present paper, the strength of the damaged-steel plate strengthened with one sided CFRP patches exposed to distilled water and concentrated sulfuric acid environments is studied experimentally. Moreover, some numerical studies have been carried out in Abaqus software. The damage shape of the steel plate is considered a central hole with two narrow notches on two sides of this hole. To prepare CFRP patches for the experimental tests, vinyl ester resin resistant to humid and acidic environments was used. The simple tensile test at room temperature is studied for evaluation of the magnitude of reinforcement. The results of these specimens compared to non-patched dry specimens show noticeable strengthening with at least 40 and 50 percent increase in load-carrying capacity and displacement, respectively. Moreover, the comparison between the tensile test results of patched-specimens immersed in distilled water and concentrated sulfuric acid (for the duration of 8 weeks) with the dry patched ones show less than 4 percent decrease in load carrying-capacity. Comparison studies between the numerical and experimental results show that load–displacement diagrams and the failure modes are in good consistency with each other.

Keywords