Mechanisms of crack propagation due to corrosion of reinforcement in concrete by AE-SiGMA and BEM

Abstract

Nucleation of corrosion cracking is analyzed by acoustic emission-simplified Green's functions for moment tensor analysis, by which crack kinematics of locations, types and orientations are quantitatively determined. These kinematical outcomes are obtained as 3D locations and vectors, and thus visualized three-dimensionally by using virtual reality modeling language. The procedure is applied to corrosion cracking in reinforced concrete. To clarify the mechanisms of crack extension due to corrosion, numerical analysis is conducted by the boundary element method. A relation between the stress intensity factors and the increment of crack extension is studied on three crack patterns due to corrosion. The dimensionless stress intensity factors and the cracking modes are investigated. It is confirmed that cracking mechanisms due to corrosion of reinforcement are dominantly of the mode-I crack, along with mixed-mode and mode-II cracks.