Fiberglass rebar vs metal rebar

[Sedgehammer]

Been told by our metal supplier that 1/2" FG is as strong as #5, 60 metal, but lighter and cheaper by a buck. Anyone use it?

[sawguy21]

Interesting! I have never seen it.

[alan gage]

It's been carried locally for a couple years here. I think some of the concrete guys have embraced it and others haven't. When the manufacturer's say it meets specs and is strong enough I tend to take their word for it after a little research. Sounds like it's been good so far.

I used it in a grade beam for my wood shop foundation. The cement guy used steel in the 4' stem/retaining walls that were poured on top of it.

Alan

[Sedgehammer]

It's been carried locally for a couple years here. I think some of the concrete guys have embraced it and others haven't. When the manufacturer's say it meets specs and is strong enough I tend to take their word for it after a little research. Sounds like it's been good so far.

I used it in a grade beam for my wood shop foundation. The cement guy used steel in the 4' stem/retaining walls that were poured on top of it.

Alan

:D :D

Question Alan & @nybhh & @jmouton my crete guy wants me to buy all the corners. They being #5 x 24". I'm kinda not liking all the joints stacked on top of each other. any issues here?

Footin is 16x24. runnin 2 stacks of 3. over lappin 18" w/ 3 ties. That said, all those joints in the corners are right on top of each other 

[Rodman]

SH, I've been doing rebar for 32 years never used the fiberglass stuff. You shouldn't need corner bars in the footings. Just run the bars to the outside of the footing each way to create a 3 bar mat in the corner. Only ever had 1 engineer ask for corner bars in the footing. He was just out of school lol.      Les

I assume you are talking footers (strip footings up here in Canada ) for your foundation walls???

[Walnut Beast]

Get your rebar bender and your little ties go to town and pour baby pour 😂. The days of doing concrete form walls of blowouts, pour lines , concrete spill overs, concrete trucks getting stuck, yelling, cursing 🤬 and no help on and on fun times. Then the refreshments 😂😂

[Sedgehammer]

SH, I've been doing rebar for 32 years never used the fiberglass stuff. You shouldn't need corner bars in the footings. Just run the bars to the outside of the footing each way to create a 3 bar mat in the corner. Only ever had 1 engineer ask for corner bars in the footing. He was just out of school lol.      Les

I assume you are talking footers (strip footings up here in Canada ) for your foundation walls???

Great. That saves $150!

Oh, I'm just being silly. Footings they is. 

[Sedgehammer]

Get your rebar bender and your little ties go to town and pour baby pour 😂. The days of doing concrete form walls of blowouts, pour lines , concrete spill overs, concrete trucks getting stuck, yelling, cursing 🤬 and no help on and on fun times. Then the refreshments 😂😂

Refreshments always! As well as cursing. Blow outs no more! I refuse to have them..... Truck can't get stuck, it's on hard surface. Since footing, hard to have spill overs as pouring onto the ground. Have lots of rebar to tie though.....

[jmouton]

i am one of them who havent embraced the fiberglass rebar yet ,  not alot of our concrete suppliers sell it , the retailers sell it to some degree,,  it looks great to use especially how light it is ,,  we use about 5000 ft a yr ,  just havent switched ,  plus the engineers here in mich are dumb as a box of rocks ,,,   just look at our rds, use the same spec for decades and expect a different result,

[Resonator]

Never used fiberglass rebar, all my experience is with steel. One thing I would be sure that it has some kind of texture for the concrete to adhere to, steel has a pattern rolled into it for this reason. Also you sure wouldn't be bending any 90 degree corners with fiberglass bar.

[Edvantage]

They make gator bar, a fiberglass/ polymer rebar, here in the U.P. It's a new product. I see semi loads of it shipping out. It's outer roughness is equivalent to steel rebar. I know a few contractors using it they like it.

[Nebraska]

I used some in the last concrete I poured ,it was all the little lumber yard in town had on hand.  Was a pain to cut compared to  steel.  It had a grooved texture   just can't bend It like steel.  It worked fine as far as I could tell.

[tule peak timber]

The price difference may not last long as it's tied to the oil industry.The new rebar might also have a strong niche in coastal area building.If it was around a century ago,Alcatraz might still be open.

[Sedgehammer]

$7.77 #4 FRP
$11.88 #5 metal
You can buy corners for FRP 
FRP tensile strength is 2× for same sized rebar
What i don't like is that initial movement. Metal is better

[tule peak timber]

No rust in storage,,,,but sunlight will degrade it.

[Walnut Beast]

Are they using it in State highways 🛣?? 

[Sauna freak]

I'm a big fan of fiberglass rebar.  I can't comment on the strength and engineering aspects of it.  Rather, it doesn't raise hell with my directional drilling locating sonde and receiver like metal rebar does.  Not a fan of guessing depth and direction while paralleling multiple utilities under concrete!

[Resonator]

One thing I've learned if you use steel, always buy 20' sticks of rebar, not 10'. The cost per foot is less, which adds up on a big job. I bought mine from a local steel supply yard, and had to do a little creative hauling with my utility trailer using an old barn ladder as support. (Yes I flagged the overhang.) ;D

[Ed]

Having experienced just how crappy fibermesh is in concrete here in Michigan.....cement is to expensive to take a chance on fiberglass rebar.
Nothankyouverymuch!

Ed

[Sedgehammer]

One thing I've learned if you use steel, always buy 20' sticks of rebar, not 10'. The cost per foot is less, which adds up on a big job. I bought mine from a local steel supply yard, and had to do a little creative hauling with my utility trailer using an old barn ladder as support. (Yes I flagged the overhang.) ;D

Agreed. We sometimes even buy it at the rebar distributor. It's in 40' lengths and we can cut it to size if we want, but they aren't always the cheapest.

[Sedgehammer]

Having experienced just how crappy fibermesh is in concrete here in Michigan.....cement is to expensive to take a chance on fiberglass rebar.
Nothankyouverymuch!

Ed

Our engineer just signed off on using it. It's being used even by state gov in road building @Walnut Beast 

[Mike W]

Did a project on the Honolulu International Airport, Diamondhead concourse, third level is where the WikiWiki buses run, they wanted to enlarge the bus size and the wear slab / waterproofing had also failed and allowed leakage on the second floor pedestrian concourse.  During demolition of the wear slab and waterproofing, it was discovered some box girders didn't have enough coverage over the #12 rebar originally installed and rusted out pretty badly.  Some you could run a tape measure up the hole where steel rebar used to be a couple feet or more, pretty scary stuff when you think of all that concrete and buses running above your head with mostly just compound pressures of the un-reinforced concrete pinching itself from just outright collapsing.  

Fiberglass reinforcing was spec'd out for all the new work and unforeseen repair work that we performed.  Seems there is a calling for it in hostile environments where water and salt intrusion is expected to occur. 

[Don P]

I was wondering about that. Prestressed concrete, well most tensile load reinforced work isn't "working" till the concrete cracks and the reinforcement goes into tension. At which point water and oxygen have a nice path. Rust is no different than ice in expansion and destruction force. I've never even seen it but fiberglass rod sounds like a good idea.

[Walnut Beast]

Sounds like it's a go and has been tested and is being used in commercial applications as stated. I'm sure cost is in some equations. Very interesting. 

[peakbagger]

I have not used it but basalt rebar sounds intriguing.Basalt Rebar reinforcement is an alternative to steel and fiberglass for reinforcing concrete its used by shotcrete contractors. Since it does not rust, t does not need the cover that standard rebar does.