A closer look at corrosion of steel reinforcement bars in concrete using 3D neutron and X-ray computed tomography
Journal article, 2021

Corrosion of reinforcing bars constitutes the largest threat to the durability of concrete structures. Thus, several studies have investigated the nature of the corrosion products, most using post-mortem analyses. However, corrosion products evolve when in contact with oxygen, hindering result interpretation. This work presents instead a state-of-the-art, non-destructive 3D method for the assessment of corrosion of embedded reinforcements. Multimodal neutron and X-ray tomography was used to observe, non-destructively, the characteristics of the corrosion products in two concrete samples, with the aim of investigating possible benefits of the use of this technique for reinforced concrete structures. One sample was naturally corroded, extracted from an 81-year-old bridge, the other was corroded via the galvanostatic method, resulting in corrosion-induced cracks. Quantitative and qualitative data was acquired, including the iron-to-rust volumetric ratio in macroscopic interfacial voids and the thickness of the corrosion layer at the steel concrete interface. The iron-to-rust volumetric ratio corresponded to large, soluble, corrosion products, forming in environments with low availability of oxygen for both samples.

Corrosion

Reinforced concrete

3D neutron and X-ray computed tomography

Author

Samanta Robuschi

Chalmers, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Structural Engineering

Alessandro Tengattini

Grenoble Alpes University

Institut Laue-Langevin

Jelke Dijkstra

Chalmers, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Geology and Geotechnics

Ignasi Fernandez

Chalmers, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Structural Engineering

Karin Lundgren

Chalmers, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Structural Engineering

Cement and Concrete Research

0008-8846 (ISSN)

Vol. 144 106439

Effect of cracks on reinforcement corrosion (Cracor)

Swedish Transport Administration (TRV2019/108016), 2019-11-01 -- 2022-12-31.

Subject Categories

Materials Chemistry

Other Materials Engineering

Corrosion Engineering

DOI

10.1016/j.cemconres.2021.106439

More information

Latest update

11/27/2021