Experimental investigation on glass fiber reinforced polymer composite transmission tower with special reference connections

Abstract

Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymers (GFRP) possess significant newlinecharacteristics such as light-weight, corrosion resistant, non-conductive, newlineenvironmentally friendly, high tensile strength, low moisture absorption newlinecapacity, and lesser life cycle cost. As such, these materials are proven newlinesuccessful in aerospace, military, shipping, car, construction industries, sports newlineand recreation, marine and energy sectors. On reviewing the published articles newlinerelated to this aspect, it is found that papers dealing with the crushing newlinebehavior of GFRP angle sections and articles related to studies on the newlineconnection s behavior of lattice tower members made up of GFRP are very newlinescarce. The utilization of GFRP materials in Transmission Line Tower (TLT) newlineis the current trend in many countries like USA, China, Russia, Canada, newlineNorway and European Union. Further, GFRP materials are rapidly being newlineconsidered for the fabrication of cross arms and poles throughout the utility newlineindustry in these countries considering economic and other engineering newlinefactors. newlineBy using GFRP pultruded members in the TLT, the configuration newlineof towers can reasonably be reduced and materials can be saved up to 50%. newlineThe use of GFRP in TLT has been increasing trends during the past decades newlinein various countries. Under such circumstance, it is observed from the newlineliterature that attempts to fabricate and tests the TLT using FRP materials are newlinegrowing these days in India. The main challenge for the use of FRP for this newlineapplication is an efficient connection between members. Only a few research newlineworks have been taken up on connections between GFRP members and plate newlineconnections. However, published article in this area of research is available newlineonly on bolted GFRP plate-to-plate connection behaviors only. newline