Development of a model to predict the durability of reinforced concrete structures in marine environment

• Oleyda Morón Universidad del Zulia-Venezuela
• Oladis Rincón Universidad del Zulia-Venezuela
• Cézar García Universidad del Zulia-Venezuela
• Idelfonso Arrieta Universidad del Zulia-Venezuela
• José Bravo Universidad del Zulia-Venezuela

Palabras clave: diffusion, chloride ions, durability, reinforced concrete

Resumen

 

This paper proposes a model that enable to estimate the durability of reinforced concrete structures exposed to marine environment. To that effect, different models proposed by the literature were used, where the diffusion coefficient is function of the concentration, departing of the fact that the transfer process of the chloride ions is controlled by purely diffusion flow. A total of 44 concrete nucleus served as base for this research. Thus, the results of chloride ions contamination determined in different elements of the General Rafael Urdaneta Bridge (PGRU) were used. The PGRU, a 39 year structure, is located front Caribbean Sea with a very aggresive environmental condition. The results indicate that it does not exist an unique model that is applied to all the evaluated structure, for the valuation criteria assumed in the selection of the models, but, as a rule depend on the quality of the concrete (equal model for a same element). However, the Hall´s model was the one which fit better to the results (70% of the cases).