Service life prediction of reinforced concrete structures

This paper is focused on the estimation of durability and service life of r einforced concrete structures. Assuming that the chloride ion in concrete c an be absorbed on tricalcium aluminate, calcium silicate hydrate, and by ot her constituents of hardened cement paste, hydrated or not, the exact analy tical solution of the governing partial differential equation together with its boundary and initial conditions can be obtained through nondimensional parameters and Laplace's transform. When the results of an exact analytica l solution using suitable parameters were compared with the results of prev ious experimental work, the differences were found to be very small. This s uggests that the absorption model is of considerable value. The exact analy tical solution with the saturation parameter and time and diffusion coeffic ients under different effective electrical potential could be used to predi ct both the experimental results and the service life of reinforced concret e structures. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.