Acoustic Emission Historic Index and Frequency Spectrum of Reinforced Concrete under Accelerated Corrosion
Publication: Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 26, Issue 9
Abstract
The main cause of degradation for reinforced concrete (RC) structures is the corrosion of the steel reinforcement. Laboratory tests aimed at studying durability are typically accelerated to provide usable results within a reasonable period of time, and well-established electrochemical techniques are used for the assessment of corrosion. However, because these techniques are not suitable for continuous monitoring and are often intrusive, nondestructive testing (NDT) techniques are also suitable for monitoring. Acoustic emission (AE) is one of the NDT techniques used to detect the onset and progression of corrosion. This paper presents an accelerated corrosion test setup and AE monitoring methodology based on the historic index, , for laboratory experiments on RC specimens. Accelerated corrosion is attained by increasing the capillarity suction of RC exposed to chlorides. The frequency spectrum of the AE signals before and after the initiation of corrosion is investigated to isolate the frequency components associated with corrosion. It is shown that the AE signals generated by early corrosion excite a well-defined narrow band of the frequency spectrum.
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Acknowledgments
The authors are grateful for the financial support of the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Technology Innovation Program, and Cooperative Agreement Number 70NANB9H9007. The authors would also like to thank Central Concrete Supermix, Inc. for their technical assistance.
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Published In
Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 26 • Issue 9 • September 2014
Copyright
© 2014 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jan 29, 2013
Accepted: Oct 10, 2013
Published online: Oct 12, 2013
Published in print: Sep 1, 2014
Discussion open until: Oct 15, 2014
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