Rehabilitation Technique for Severely Damaged Concrete Gravity Dams

Abstract

Concrete gravity dams are more likely to experience severe cracking during large earthquakes because concrete is quasi-brittle in nature. Thus, the prevention of concrete cracking in the dam and its successful rehabilitation are among the important issues for the engineering community. This paper investigates the suitability of a retrofitting technique, which can be used for the rehabilitation of severely damaged concrete gravity dams. The retrofitting technique adopted in this study is composed of epoxy grouting and uses anchorage bolts and external buttress wall application. A comparison is made between cyclic behavior of small-scale concrete gravity dam models before and after retrofitting to quantify the effectiveness of the retrofitting technique. Cyclic behavior of concrete gravity dam models is obtained through experimental testing, which is also verified through the finite-element model simulation. The study shows that the strength and postyield behavior of the retrofitted concrete gravity dam model is significantly improved.