Numerical modelling of moisture ingress in cracked concrete
Master thesis
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http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2454356Utgivelsesdato
2017Metadata
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Sammendrag
Concrete is a construction material which service life can be significantly reduced with thepresence of cracks when concrete is exposed to aggressive agents such as chlorides. Thecurrent service life models for concrete do not account for cracks when modelling servicelife of concrete structures. In this thesis, moisture transport in concrete with a crack andaggregates was modelled numerically using finite element analysis. The numerical model wasapplied to a wedge spitting test geometry and tested against experimental data, and was usedto identify how the crack and aggregates influence moisture ingress. The numerical model wasable to model the ingress extend in vertical and lateral directions with a very goodagreement with the experimental data, both for the un-cracked and cracked state. The moisturedistribution was more accurately modelled with the heterogeneous models including aggregatescompared to the homogenous models without aggregates. By observing the behavior of thenumerical model when varying the number of solutions that is interpolated and averaged togive rise to the heterogeneous models including aggregates, it was found that theheterogeneous models converge towards the homogenous models, when the number of interpolatedsolutions that are included go towards infinity.