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Influence of fiber content and reinforcement ratio on the water permeability of reinforced concrete

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Abstract

In service, reinforced concrete structures undergo various stresses inducing cracks. These cracks provide a preferential path for water and aggressive agents penetration into concrete, which compromises the structural durability by accelerating concrete and steel reinforcement deterioration. In this context, durability of cracked concrete has become an important research topic and can be studied through the permeability of concrete. This research project focuses on the influence of the fiber content and steel reinforcement ratio on the water permeability of reinforced concrete. Water permeability tests were carried out simultaneously with a uniaxial tensile loading applied on reinforced concrete prisms made of high performance concrete (HPC), high performance fiber reinforced concrete (HPFRC) and ultra high performance fiber reinforced concrete (UHPFRC). In service conditions, permeability is reduced by 31, 92 and 99 % for fiber contents of 0.75 % (HPFRC), 1.5 % (HPFRC) and 2 % (UHPFRC) respectively compared with conventional HPC. The increase of steel reinforcement ratio from 1.23 to 2.47 % reduced the permeability by 70 % at service loading.

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Acknowledgments

This research project has been financially supported by the Québec Research Fund on Nature and Technologies (FQRNT) and by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC). The authors are grateful to Holcim, Bekaert, Euclid and Sika for their material donations for achieving this research project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Center on Concrete Infrastructures (CRIB), Group for Research in Structural Engineering, Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering, Polytechnique Montreal, Montreal, H3C 3A7, Canada

    Maxime Hubert, Clélia Desmettre & Jean-Philippe Charron

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  1. Maxime Hubert
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  2. Clélia Desmettre
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  3. Jean-Philippe Charron
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Correspondence to Jean-Philippe Charron.

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Hubert, M., Desmettre, C. & Charron, JP. Influence of fiber content and reinforcement ratio on the water permeability of reinforced concrete. Mater Struct 48, 2795–2807 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1617/s11527-014-0354-z

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