Patent ID: 8578537

Claim:
A structural concrete beam, comprising: a lowermost-prefabricated structural concrete portion having an uppermost point and a lowermost point; an uppermost poured-in-place structural concrete portion, wherein said poured-in-place structural concrete portion comprises at least ten percent of the total weight of said structural concrete beam; wherein said uppermost poured-in-place structural concrete portion extends substantially above said uppermost point of said lowermost prefabricated structural concrete portion; wherein said uppermost poured-in-place portion is constructed utilizing temporary formwork; wherein said lowermost prefabricated structural concrete portion is sufficiently strong to support the moment load produced by the placement of fresh concrete of the poured-in-place portion and the self-weight of the prefabricated portion itself; reinforcing extending from said lowermost prefabricated structural concrete portion into said uppermost poured-in-place structural concrete portion; said structural concrete beam is an inverted-T beam and wherein said prefabricated structural concrete portion forms the horizontal corbel of said inverted-T beam and said poured-in-place portion forms the vertical web portion of said inverted-T beam.