To study the bending performance of prestressed steelbamboo composite I-shaped beams

12 prestressed composite I-shaped beams were designed and manufactured for bending tests

considering prestress loads

prestressing schemes

and loading schemes as basic parameters. The experimental phenomenon was observed

and failure characteristics were analyzed during the test. The influences of different parameters on the load-bearing capacity

strain distribution

and deformation performance were explored

and an approximate formula for the bearing capacity of the prestress composite beam was proposed. The results indicated that the prestressed composite beams have relatively good performances from the perspectives of combination effect

deformation characteristic

and bearing capacity. Failure modes of tested specimens were mainly owing to the bamboo flanges damage and the local buckling of steel plates. With the technique of prestress and the increase of prestress level

the deformation performances can be improved effectively

as well as the load-bearing capacity considering the same deflection situation. Moreover

the improvements can be more significant with the two-point prestressing scheme. The mid-span strain distribution of prestressed composite beams conforms to the plane section assumption

and the neutral axis moves down with the increase of the prestressing level. Finally

the bearing capacities based on the theoretical calculation matched well with the experimental results

which showed the applicability of the proposed methods.