ORIGINAL ARTICLE Flexural behavior of reinforced recycled aggregate concrete beams under short-term loading Ivan S. Ignjatovic ´ • Snez ˇana B. Marinkovic ´ • Zoran M. Mis ˇkovic ´ • Aleksandar R. Savic ´ Received: 20 April 2012 / Accepted: 28 September 2012 / Published online: 9 October 2012 Ó RILEM 2012 Abstract Recycling of waste concrete is one of the sustainable solutions for the growing waste disposal crisis and depletion of natural aggregate sources. As a result, recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) is pro- duced, and so far it has mostly been used in low-value applications such as for the pavement base. But, from the standpoint of promoting resource and energy savings and environmental preservation, it is essential to study whether a concrete made of recycled aggre- gates—recycled aggregate concrete (RAC) can be effectively used as a structural material. The experi- mental research presented in this paper is performed in order to investigate the flexural behavior of RAC beams when compared to the behavior of natural aggregate concrete (NAC) beams under short-term loading and consequently the possibility of using RAC in structural concrete elements. Three different per- centages of coarse RCA in total mass of coarse aggregate in concrete mixtures (0 %—NAC, 50 %— RAC50, and 100 %—RAC100), and three different reinforcement ratios (0.28, 1.46, and 2.54 %) were the governing parameters in this investigation. Full-scale tests were performed on nine simply supported beams until the failure load had been reached. Comparison of load-deflection behavior, crack patterns, service deflections, failure modes and ultimate flexural capac- ity of NAC and RAC beams was made based on our own and other researchers’ test results. The results of conducted analysis showed that the flexural behavior of RAC beams is satisfactory comparing to the behavior of NAC beams, for both the service and ultimate loading. It is concluded that, within the limits of this research, the use of RAC in reinforced concrete beams is technically feasible. Keywords Recycled aggregate concrete Á Reinforced concrete beams Á Flexural behavior Á Short-term loading 1 Introduction The shortage of space for construction and demolition waste disposal and high renting costs of landfills is becoming a common problem in urban areas [20]. One of the solutions to the problems related to disposal of construction and demolition waste and depletion of natural resources of aggregates is recycling of depos- ited building materials, primarily concrete. It can be processed so as to obtain the recycled concrete I. S. Ignjatovic ´(&) Á S. B. Marinkovic ´ Á Z. M. Mis ˇkovic ´ Á A. R. Savic ´ Faculty of Civil Engineering, University of Belgrade, Bulevar Kralja Aleksandra 73, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia e-mail: ivani@imk.grf.bg.ac.rs S. B. Marinkovic ´ e-mail: sneska@imk.grf.bg.ac.rs Z. M. Mis ˇkovic ´ e-mail: mzoran@imk.grf.bg.ac.rs A. R. Savic ´ e-mail: sasha@imk.grf.bg.ac.rs Materials and Structures (2013) 46:1045–1059 DOI 10.1617/s11527-012-9952-9