Laterally Restrained Bamboo Concrete Composite Arch under Uniformly Distributed Loading

Abstract

The arch, as a structural element, has been used since ancient times, originally in stone or timber, more recently in reinforced concrete or steel. However, the more modern materials involving steel and concrete are highly energy and carbon intensive. Hardwood timber, although renewable, takes between 30 and 50 years to grow when used structurally. But a highly sustainable tropical material, bamboo, a woody grass, requires only 4–5 years of growth before its considerable compressive and tensile strength can be used for developing structural arches for load-bearing applications. This paper investigates the structural performance of bamboo-concrete (Bamcrete) composite parabolic tied arches of span 4.5 m with a rise-to-span ratio of 0.2 under a uniformly distributed loading. An innovative technique of integrating two slender bamboos of the