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Purpose This paper aims to reveal the corrosion mechanism and corrosion development regulation of marine engineering structural steel in the marine environment and provide constructive suggestions for marine immersed tunnel engineering. Design/methodology/approach In this study, marine engineering structural steel’s behavior and corrosion prediction were carried out under the conditions of no cathodic protection and under-protection by artificially adding dissolved oxygen in a simulated seawater solution as a depolarizing agent. Findings Marine resources are rich in China. With the development of the economy and the improvement of engineering technology, marine engineering structural steel is used more and more widely. Engineering structural steel has a great risk of corrosion failure for long-term service in seawater, as seawater is a kind of corrosive medium containing various salts. At present, there are few projects and research studies available on the corrosion in the seawater environment of Q390C engineering structural steel, which is used in the Shenzhen–Zhongshan Link immersed tunnel steel shell at home and abroad. It cannot guide the corrosion of immersed tunnel steel shells in the ocean. Originality/value In this paper, the corrosion mechanism and corrosion development regulation of marine engineering structural steel in the marine environment are studied by accelerated corrosion test in the laboratory, which is of great significance to ensure the long-life durability of the immersed tunnel in marine engineering.

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Plastic shrinkage cracking propagating at early ages inevitably impairs the performance of concrete structures. To mitigate this, using a recently developed shrinkage-reducing polycarboxylate superplasticiser (SR-PCA) with outstanding shrinkage-reducing and water-reducing effectiveness can be a promising approach. The present work aims to investigate the effect of SR-PCA on plastic shrinkage cracking and to clarify the underlying mechanisms. For comparison, a traditional polyether type shrinkage reducing admixture (SRA) and a polycarboxylate superplasticiser (PCA) were also used. Based on the investigations on horizontal shrinkage, settlement, bleeding, evaporation mass loss, cement hydration, surface tension of pore fluid and capillary pressure, the underlying working mechanisms of SR-PCA were identified. The results indicate that SR-PCA is able to reduce the crack area, maximum crack width and average crack width by up to 55%, 48% and 50%, respectively. Furthermore, prolonging the bleeding duration and initial time of capillary pressure build-up caused by retarding the cement hydration, lowering the evaporation mass loss, and a lower development rate of capillary stresses and capillary pressure peak value induced by decreasing the surface tension of pore fluid are responsible for preventing the plastic shrinkage cracking of mortars containing SR-PCA.

A partial pre-rusted wire beam electrode (WBE) was designed to study the influence of the rust layer on rebar corrosion in the carbonated simulated concrete pore solution (SCPS). The results show that the passive film generated on the pre-rusted steel area is more fragile than that formed on the fine polished steel area in carbonaceous media. Nevertheless, the pitting corrosion resulting from the presence of chloride ions still tends to occur on the fine polished steel surface due to the local acidification process being hindered by the rust layer. The rust layer could play a more important role than the passive film in inhibiting the initiation of chloride-induced corrosion on rebar. The expansion path of the corrosion product would be blocked by the rust layer, leading to the pit propagating in the fine polished region. Furthermore, the growth of pitting corrosion is greatly accelerated due to the catalytic cathodic reaction of the rust layer.