Assessment of thermal stress risk in mass concrete elements: use of expedited diagrams

Abstract

Large structural elements have been commonly observed in increasingly tall buildings, employing mass concrete elements in their foundations. In these elements, the internal heat generated by the cement hydration can be decisive for the occurrence of pathological manifestations arising from the balance of stresses and also by delayed ettringite formation. This article presents a practical and expedited method, through diagrams, for a preliminary assessment of the thermo-tensional risk involved in the concreting of large-scale elements. For the development of thermal risk diagrams, the commercial software TSA-2D was used, where 64 numerical computational simulations were conducted, varying the parameters with the greatest influence on the concrete thermal phenomenon (minimum dimension of the structural element, cement content per cubic meter, cement hydration heat, concrete placement temperature, and ambient temperature). The result of this methodology, when compared to computational simulations and field monitoring in a specific case study, showed a good correlation, with the potential for application and reproducibility, considering the natural limitations of an expeditious practice that needs to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, but which provide an important guideline in the early decision-making on-site. Furthermore, the maximum absolute error between the results of computational simulation and field monitoring was only 1.6%.