Japan Successfully Develops Aseismic Concrete With Plastic Fibers

The Japanese Institute of disaster prevention and technology, in collaboration with Tokyo Institutet of Technology, has made new concrete with plastic fibers instead of crushed stones in construction materials.

Experiments show that

Ordinary concrete is made of cement and sand and crushed stones.

Kawashima Kazuhiko, Professor of Tokyo Institutet of Technology, and other researchers reported that they made the raw material of polypropylene plastic storage bin, made of polypropylene, with a length of 1.2 cm and a width of 0.03 mm.

Since then, researchers from Kawashima Kazuhiko and Japan disaster prevention science and Technology Research Institute have carried out the 3 tests on shaking table for the pier model with the same shaking strength as that of the Kobe earthquake, and then increased the shaking strength of the shaking table to 1.5 times of the Hanshin earthquake, and carried out 3 experiments.

It is found that there are no other damages except 10 tiny cracks on the pier model.

Experts believe that this is due to mixing.

Kawashima Kazuhiko pointed out that during the Hanshin earthquake, some viaducts of the highway were capsized. If the above technology was used to manufacture the viaduct building materials, it would be expected to improve the seismic strength.

The use of this new technology may lead to higher cost, Kawashima Kazuhiko believes that as long as mass production is achieved, the cost can be reduced, and such bridges will avoid major losses if they do not collapse in a large earthquake.