Study of the influence of aggregate size distribution on mechanical properties of concrete by acoustic emission technique

Acoustic emission (AE) has been widely used in concrete research as a dynam ic nondestructive test method. In this study, the AE characteristics of con crete with different aggregate size distributions under uniaxial compressio n and three-point-bending were studied. Parameters such as maximum aggregat e size, compressive strain and fracture energies of different concretes wer e also measured and discussed. The lest results show that the characteristi cs of AE signals from concrete can illustrate the failure process in both c ompression and three-point-bending. The fracture energy increases with incr ement of the maximum aggregate size. Moreover, there is a good relationship between AE hits and fracture energy. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All ri ghts reserved.