Study on Thermal Field of Mass Concrete by Experiment and Numerical Simulation

Abstract

An experimental study is conducted to simulate the thermal field in mass concrete. Accurate prediction of the thermal stress by analysis is quite difficult particularly at early ages, due to uncertain age-dependent properties of concrete. A series of tests was conducted in which the temperature was measured for a large number of observation points. The effect of aging and the amount of measuring points on thermal field development that can occur in realistic structures was evaluated. Numerical simulations of the thermal field setup were also performed using the finite element with ANSYS software to verify and extend the experimental interpretation and to determine the maximum temperature value which would occur under construction process. Mass concrete temperature field and stress field for specific projects were measured and analyzed. Numerical simulation of mass concrete temperature field for the actual project is compared with the measured results. The results show that the temperature field of numerical simulation results and measured curves result are of the same trend. And it is feasible that mass concrete temperature field is simulated based on ANSYS.