Numerical evaluation of the corrosion effects in prestressed concrete beams without shear reinforcement

In press.Corrosion of prestressed concrete structures causes size reduction of strands, degradation of mechanical properties of steel, cracking of the surrounding concrete, and bond decay at steel‐to‐concrete interface. In this paper, a numerical approach able to take into account all the effects involved in the corrosion process by using nonlinear finite element analysis (NLFEA) and membrane or shell elements modeling is proposed. Two different strategies are adopted to model strands: the smeared and the discrete approaches. The results obtained using these latter strategies are validated by comparing NLFEA results with experimental measurements of a naturally corroded prestressed beam tested at the “Instituto de Ciencias de la Construcción Eduardo Torroja” in Madrid. Finally, pros and cons of the proposed modeling approach are critically analyzed, demonstrating that considering the actual spatial corrosion distribution is necessary to predict the position where failure occurs.The financial support from the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research (PRIN Grant 2015HZ24KH—“Failure mechanisms caused by corrosive degrade and by lack of constructive details in the existing structures in reinforced concrete”) is gratefully acknowledged.Peer reviewe