Self‐damage sensing of electrically conductive self‐compacting concrete incorporating short carbon fibers

Abstract

This study focused on the incorporation of pitch-based short carbon fibers in the self-compacting concrete (SCC) to obtain electrically conductive carbon fiber-based SCC (CFBSCC) composite. The dispersion of carbon fiber in the SCC was done utilizing a low-speed mechanical churner along with a surfactant. The ultimate goal was to impart the smart properties of carbon fiber into SCC to form electrically conductive CFBSCC which could sense its own stress, strain, or damage without using external sensors thereby developing a self-sensing concrete. The impact of the volume of carbon fibers on the compressive strength and electrical properties for 10 SCC mixes were investigated. The conductive CFBSCC was further investigated for its smart self-sensing behavior by correlating it with the piezoresistive properties. Test results showed that the incorporation of carbon fibers in SCC can improve its compressive strength properties and electrical conducting properties depending upon the percentage of carbon fibers employed. It was also found that the self-sensing ability can be developed in SCC using carbon fibers.