Effect of Cooling Pipe in Thin-Walled Hydraulic Structure during Construction

Abstract

In view of the problem of concrete crack in the period of construction, this paper introduces the cause and the forming mechanism of crack in thin-walled concrete structure and points out that the difference between the inside and outside temperature at early stage and the basic difference of the temperature at later stage are considered as the main factors influencing the phenomena. This paper puts forward the application of pipe cooling which is used in the mass concrete to the thin-walled concrete structure. In doing so, the difference of the internal and surface temperature is reduced and the appearance of cracking is avoided. Under the basic theories of temperature field and stress field of concrete, the 3-D FEM with the numerical algorithm of pipe cooling is adopted to simulate the thermal field and stresses field of concrete aqueduct during construction and the result shows that good effect of temperature control and crack prevention is achieved in thin-walled concrete structure. At the same time, water cooling pipe has many merits including simple operation, easy adjustment, high adaptability, and low cost