Nitrogen gas-pressure tension testing of concrete
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Date
1995
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Publisher
University of New Brunswick
Abstract
Concrete is the most-used construction material in civil engineering projects in
the world today due to its versatility, durability and economy. Although, tensile
strengths are not usually considered in design they are important since cracking in
concrete is a tensile failure phenomena and one of the most commonly cited
reasons for concrete's lack of performance. There are several common methods
used for estimating the tensile strength of concrete through indirect tension tests.
These methods are the splitting tensile and the flexure test. As a variation to the
splitting tensile test, a new test has been developed in which nitrogen gas-pressure
is applied to the curved surface of a concrete cylinder to produce a tensile failure.
The purpose of this study was to compare the nitrogen gas-pressure test with the
flexure and splitting tensile tests. A secondary objective of the study was to
compare the concrete strength results with the values given in the literature so
that the relative effects of alkali-aggregate reactivity (AAR) on the various
strength properties could be ascertained.
Two test programs were utilized. The first test program was designed to compare
the results from the three indirect tension tests using normal weight concrete of
different compressive strengths. The results of this study determined that the
tensile strength values obtained using the nitrogen gas-pressure test were similar
to those of the flexure and splitting tensile tests. The second test program was
designed to compare the strength development with time for a normal weight,
lightweight and reactive aggregate concrete. The results from this study
determined that the strength of the concrete decreased due to exposure to AAR.
Also, the nitrogen gas-pressure tensile strength values decreased more than those
values obtained using the flexure or splitting tensile tests.