Study on steel-concrete composite structure incorporating BubbleDeck slab

![CDATA[Composite steel-concrete structure is an innovative technique to connect steel and concrete using shear connectors. Since the development in civil engineering, the use of conventional concrete has attracted some of the major problems in civil infrastructures such as dead loads, flexibility, slower construction and environmental concerns such as release of greenhouse gases during the production. BubbleDeck system, a new frontier in the civil structures involves recycled high density polyethylene hollow spheres, has enabled engineers to replace the concrete in the middle section of the slab where it has no structural function, thus decreasing the dead load and improving structural integrity. These biaxial slabs have many advantages over conventional slabs: green technology, increased slab span between the columns, lesser material use and easier transportation hence reducing cost of construction. The purpose of this paper is to determine the advantages of BubbleDeck system over the conventional concrete used in slabs. Specific objectives are to investigate the results produced from push-out test using different samples for fatigue strength of shear connectors and strength capacity of BubbleDeck slab. Experimental results concluded that shear capacity of BubbleDeck slab in composite structure is 5-10% less than its Control solid slab. The observations showed that pull-out in BubbleDeck slab is minor as only 1 pull-out occurred out of 16 specimens tested and that may be due to excessive air voids near shear studs. The proximity of shear connectors to voids does not have significant effect on the capacity of the stud, with respect to the designs tested. It is hoped that this study will help future researches to test designs at larger scale and the load per slip data of each test can be compared to determine the most efficient construction method for specific project.]]