Coupled fatigue‐corrosion life estimation of reinforced concrete beam: Numerical versus experimental approach

Abstract

This paper deals with the fatigue life of corroded reinforced concrete (RC) T‐beam. A fracture mechanics‐based formula incorporating reduction in cross section and nominal strength of reinforcement is developed for determining the fatigue life of a RC beam. A simplified model considering rebar fatigue damage was employed for numerical modeling. In the numerical investigation, the mathematical model was implemented in ANSYS workbench. In the experimental investigation, different degrees of corrosion were induced to the beam reinforcement by using the impressed current technique (ICT). After that, the beams were tested for fatigue by structural actuator subjecting them to three‐point loading arrangement. The fatigue lives of corroded bars were also examined experimentally after removing the bars from the tested beams. It was found that the difference between the fatigue lives obtained from the numerical and experimental models compared well. As the corrosion level increased, fatigue life also decreased. All the beams failed due to fatigue fracture of steel bars under cyclic loading. This paper aims to present an easy to implement numerical method to estimate coupled fatigue‐corrosion life of a RC T‐beam so that the requirements of tedious, time‐consuming, and costly physical testing for determination of coupled fatigue‐corrosion life can be eliminated.

Spatial characteristics of stray current corrosion of reinforcing bars in pseudo concrete

“…Besides, corrosion amount varied along the rebars axial direction, which was different from the results of accelerated galvanic‐corrosion experiment. Since in this experiment, unlike accelerated galvanic‐corrosion experiment, 42–44 the wires of power supply did not contact steel bars.…”

Temperature‐driven fatigue life of reinforced concrete integral bridge pile considering nonlinear soil–structure interaction

“…linear elastic fracture mechanics (LEFM) or elastic–plastic fracture mechanics (EPFM) are used. LEFM is valid where the fracture process zone is very small for example in rebars of RC members 22 . For concrete like quasi‐brittle material J ‐integral and crack tip opening displacement are apparently reliable and efficient for studying fatigue because these materials have a limited yielding 23 .…”

Experimental Research on Fatigue Performance of Reinforced Concrete T-Shaped Beams under Corrosion–Fatigue Coupling Action

“…An actual case of the failure of a reinforced concrete bridge due to marine environment corrosion was investigated by corrosion mass loss and mechanical testing in the laboratory [ 19 ]. Meanwhile, a lot of studies are based on experimental analysis of reinforced concrete beams subjected to corrosion and fatigue to evaluate the fatigue performance or predict the fatigue life [ 3 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 ]; usually, these tests deal with either the separate effect of corrosion and fatigue loading, in which corrosion and fatigue loading did not coexist simultaneously or the coupled effects of corrosion and sustain loading where loads remained constant during the tests. Only a few studies [ 23 , 25 , 27 ] have considered and realized the coupled effects of corrosion and fatigue loading in a laboratory experiment, and these limited research studies are basically for rectangular RC beams.…”