Probabilistic similarity of non-uniform corrosion pattern between natural corrosion and accelerated experiment

Abstract

Concrete structures can be seriously deteriorated by the corrosion of steel reinforcement lasting for decades under realistic environment. It is still controversial whether and how the natural corrosion can be reasonably accelerated in experimental simulation. This paper focuses on the probabilistic similarity of corrosion pattern by comparing the normalized configuration of natural corrosion and galvanic accelerated experiment. The former is obtained by conducting the Monte-Carlo simulation of the electrochemical process based on the meso-scale model of concrete, whist the latter is analysed using digital image correlation method. The results indicated that their number and location of corrosion peaks are statistically consistent. The configurations of corrosion are very likely to be similar within the rear region of steel reinforcement in most cases, whereas possibly to be reversed in the front inward region and front outward region. The similarity is affected by the geometry of designed specimen and humidity of simulated environment.