• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.17 no.5 s.89
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• pp.857-868
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• 2005

This paper deals with the accumulated damage in concrete structures due to the cyclic freeze-thaw as an environmental load. The cyclic ice body nucleation and growth processes in porous systems are affected by the thermo-physical and mass transport properties, and gradients of temperature and chemical potentials. Furthermore, the diffusivity of deicing chemicals shows significantly higher value under cyclic freeze-thaw conditions. Consequently, the disintegration of concrete structures is aggravated at marine environments, higher altitudes, and northern areas. However, the properties of cyclic freeze-thaw with crack growth and diffusion of chloride ion effects are hard to be identified in tests, and there has been no analytic model for the combined degradations. The main objective is to determine the driving force and evaluate the reduced strength and stiffness by freeze-thaw. For the development of computational model of those coupled deterioration, micro-pore structure characterization, pore pressure based on the thermodynamic equilibrium, time and temperature dependent super-cooling with or without deicing salts, nonlinear-fracture constitutive relation for the evaluation of internal damage, and the effect of entrained air pores (EA) has been modeled numerically. As a result, the amount of ice volume with temperature dependent surface tensions, freezing pressure and resulting deformations, and cycle and temperature dependent pore volume has been calculated and compared with available test results. The developed computational program can be combined with DuCOM, which can calculate the early aged strength, heat of hydration, micro-pore volume, shrinkage, transportation of free water in concrete. Therefore, the developed model can be applied to evaluate those various practical degradation cases as well.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.225-245
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• 2016

Settlement of foundations in permafrost regions primarily results from three physical and mechanical processes such as thaw consolidation of permafrost layer, creep of warm frozen soils and the additional deformation of seasonal active layer induced by freeze-thaw cycling. This paper firstly establishes theoretical models for the three sources of settlement including a statistical damage model for soils which experience cyclic freeze-thaw, a large strain thaw consolidation theory incorporating a modified Richards' equation and a Drucker-Prager yield criterion, as well as a simple rheological element based creep model for frozen soils. A novel numerical method was proposed for live computation of thaw consolidation, creep and freeze-thaw cycling in corresponding domains which vary with heat budget in frozen ground. It was then numerically implemented in the FISH language on the FLAC platform and verified by freeze-thaw tests on sandy clay. Results indicate that the calculated results agree well with the measured data. Finally a model test carried out on a half embankment in laboratory was modeled.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.209-217
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• 2018

The dynamic compressive behavior of concrete after freezing and thawing tests are investigated by using the split Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) technique. The stress-strain curves of concrete under dynamic loading are measured and analyzed. The setting numbers of freeze-thaw cycles are 0, 25, 50, and 75 cycles. Test results show that the dynamic strength decreases and peak strain increases with the increasing of freeze-thaw cycles. Based on the Weibull distribution model, statistical damage constitutive model for dynamic stress-strain response of concrete after freeze-thaw cycles was proposed. At last, the fragmentation test of concrete subjected to dynamic loading and freeze-thaw cycles is carried out using sieving statistics. The distributions of the fragment sizes are analyzed based on fractal theory. The fractal dimensions of concrete increase with the increasing of both freeze-thaw cycle and strain rate. The relations among the fractal dimension, strain rates and freeze-thawing cycles are developed.

• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.29-38
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• 2014

PURPOSES : The purpose of this study is to evaluate moisture susceptibility of a dense graded and an open graded asphalt mixtures by the method of AASHTO T-283. METHODS : To simulate moisture damage of asphalt pavements with continuously rainfall during summer rainy season, the dense graded and the open graded asphalt mixtures were immersed in water for 15 days and were measured the weight and the change of strength. Also, the mixtures were performed five freeze-thaw cycles to simulate moisture damage of the mixtures by freeze-thaw during winter and were measured the change of strength. The degradation characteristics model was used to analyze the relationship between strength and moisture damage. RESULTS : According to the results, the dense graded and the open graded asphalt mixtures were shown in the similar trends of the strength changes by immersion time and freeze-thaw cycle. However, the moisture damage reduction of open graded asphalt mixture was more sensitive in early phase than that of dense graded asphalt mixture.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.13-22
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• 2008

The initiation and growth processes of cyclic ice body in porous systems are affected by the thermo-physical and mass transport properties, as well as gradients of temperature and chemical potentials. Furthermore, the diffusivity of deicing chemicals shows significantly higher value under cyclic freeze-thaw conditions. Consequently, the disintegration of concrete structures is aggravated at marine environments, higher altitudes, and northern areas. However, the properties of cyclic freeze-thaw with crack growth and the deterioration by the accumulated damages are hard to identify in tests. In order to predict the accumulated damages by cyclic freeze-thaw, a regression analysis by the response surface method (RSM) is used. The important parameters for cyclic freeze-thawdeterioration of concrete structures, such as water to cement ratio, entrained air pores, and the number of cycles of freezing and thawing, are used to compose the limit state function. The regression equation fitted to the important deterioration criteria, such as accumulated plastic deformation, relative dynamic modulus, or equivalent plastic deformations, were used as the probabilistic evaluations of performance for the degraded structural resistance. The predicted results of relative dynamic modulus and residual strains after 300 cycles of freeze-thaw show very good agreements with the experimental results. The RSM result can be used to predict the probability of occurrence for designer specified critical values. Therefore, it is possible to evaluate the life cycle management of concrete structures considering the accumulated damages due to the cyclic freeze-thaw using the proposed prediction method.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.68-75
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• 2015

This study established key factors causing deck slab deterioration based on GPR database of 747 highway bridges, and predicted deck slab damage rates with respect to bridge service life. To minimize the influence of bridge service life on deck slab deterioration, the deck slab damage rate database was corrected based on a linear regression model of bridge service life vs. deck slab damage rate. The corrected deck slab damage rates were analyzed to determine correlation considering the number of snowy days, the amount of snowfalls, the number of freeze-thaw days, average winter temperature, altitude, the amount of deicing chemicals and equivalent traffic volume, and then both the number of freeze-thaw days and the amount of deicing chemicals were determined to be key factors causing deck slab deterioration. The complex deterioration considering both key factors was represented deck slab damage rate charts, and the average deck slab life was derived. The results of this study will be used as a guideline for highway bridge maintenance to identify the progress of deck slab deterioration for a given bridge and predict the time required deck slab rehabilitation.