A 2D Hydro-Mechanical Lattice Approach for Modelling Corrosion Induced Cracking of Reinforced Concrete

International audienceCorrosion induced cracking is caused by the constrained volume expansion of rust layers around corroded rebars. In the present work, the rust layer is modeled as a fluid. A hydro-mechanical lattice model is used to model the effect of pressure build up in the fluid on cracking in concrete. The hydro-mechanical lattice model is based on two dual lattices used for fluid mass transport and mechanical response, respectively. The lattices are based on randomly generated dual Delaunay and Voronoi tessellation of the specimen domain. For the mass transport lattice, one-dimensional conductive "pipes" are positioned along the facets of the Voronoi polygons. For the mechanical lattice, beam-like elements are placed on the edges of the Delaunay triangles. The mechanical and transport part of the model are coupled in two ways. Firstly, cracking in the mechanical elements increases the conductivity of the dual transport elements. Secondly, the fluid pressure in the transport elements induces additional stresses in the dual mechanical elements. The hydro-mechanical approach is applied to two cases. Firstly, the elastic response of thick-walled cylinder is analysed. Then, the elastic thick-walled cylinder analysis is extended to include cracking. \textcopyright 2014 Taylor & Francis Group