A study on shrinkage related cracking on mortars for the repair of concrete structures.

Author(s)

Manuel Ramón Grullón Peña

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Escola Politécnica (EP/BC)
• Defense date: 2004-12-15

Examining board members

Paulo Roberto do Lago Helene; Antonio Domingues de Figueiredo; Leonel Tula Sanabria

• Advisor: Paulo Roberto do Lago Helene

Abstract

The durability of concrete structures has become an issue of interest worldwide especially during the last two decades. The expenditures associated to the repair and rehabilitation of concrete structures is becoming increasingly higher, and the amount of unsucceeded repairs on concrete structures has been reported as unacceptable. In Brazil, patch repair with cement-based polymer modified mortars is the most widely technique used. One of the main causes of distress when using this type of repair has been found to be shrinkage cracking. The target of this research is to evaluate the effect of some significant properties and also some mix-design parameters on the cracking potential due to shrinkage of repair mortars. Therefore, a family of mortars with the same consistency with cement:sand proportions of 1:1,0, 1:1,5, 1:2,2 and 1:3,0; with a constant polymer and superplasticizer content related to the cement weight. Also, three industrialized polymer modified repair mortars from different manufacturers were evaluated, thus allowing classifying and comparing their cracking potential with the laboratory prepared mortars. For evaluating the cracking potential of the mortars the following tests were selected, free-shrinkage, flexural strength, elasticity modulus and restrained shrinkage. The results obtained show that the model εj - ftj/Ecj was able to distinguish the mortars that cracked during the restrained shrinkage testing from the mortars that did not crack. This model considers all of the variables measured during the experimental program affecting shrinkage related cracking. It was also verified that a more simplified study can considering only the free-shrinkage of the mortars can be applied; being that this model will always be in favor of security. For mortars of a same family it can be concluded that there is one mix-proportion that will present the least cracking tendency. (AU)