Defining tension stiffening for a concrete smeared cracking model

You can model postfailure behavior for direct straining across cracks with tension stiffening, which allows you to define the strain-softening behavior for cracked concrete. This behavior also allows the effects of the reinforcement interaction with concrete to be simulated in a simple manner.

Context:

You can specify tension stiffening by means of a postfailure stress-strain relation or by applying a fracture energy cracking criterion. See Tension stiffening, for more information.

Tension stiffening information is required for the concrete smeared cracking model.

  1. Create a material model as described in Specifying a concrete smeared cracking model.”

  2. From the Suboptions menu, select Tension Stiffening.

    A Suboption Editor appears.

  3. Click the arrow to the right of the Type field, and select a method for defining postcracking behavior:

    • Select Displacement to enter the displacement at which a linear loss of strength after cracking gives zero stress.

    • Select Strain to enter the postfailure stress-strain relationship directly.

  4. Toggle on Use temperature-dependent data to define data that depend on temperature.

    A column labeled Temp appears in the Data table.

  5. Click the arrows to the right of the Number of field variables field to increase or decrease the number of field variables on which the data depend.

  6. In the Data table, enter the data relevant to your Type choice from Step 3 (not all of the following will apply):

    Disp

    Displacement, u0, at which a linear loss of strength after cracking gives zero stress. (Units of L.)

    sigma/sigma_c

    Fraction of remaining stress to stress at cracking.

    epsilon-epsilon_c

    Absolute value of the direct strain minus the direct strain at cracking.

    Temp

    Temperature.

    Field n

    Predefined field variables.

    You may need to expand the dialog box to see all the columns in the Data table. For detailed information on how to enter data, see Entering tabular data.

  7. Click OK to return to the Edit Material dialog box.