Identifying All Internal Forces in Existing Reinforced Concrete Components Using the Stress Release Method

Area of Science:

• Civil Engineering
• Structural Engineering
• Materials Science

Background:

• Assessing internal forces in existing concrete structures is vital for safety.
• Idealized models often fail to accurately represent actual internal forces.
• Stress release technology offers a practical solution for in-situ force identification.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce and validate a stress release technology for identifying internal forces in reinforced concrete components.
• To provide theoretical derivations for strain calculations under internal forces.
• To experimentally verify the accuracy and feasibility of the proposed method.

Main Methods:

• Derivation of normal and shear strains based on stress release principles.
• Finite element modeling to analyze groove geometry and reinforcement ratio effects.
• Experimental testing using the grooving method on reinforced concrete components under various loads.

Main Results:

• Internal forces accurately identified by measuring strain on three surface midpoints.
• Numerical simulations show strong agreement with experimental results.
• Axial force and bending moment identification errors are within 10%.

Conclusions:

• The stress release method is a feasible and accurate technique for measuring internal forces in existing reinforced concrete components.
• This technology enhances the evaluation of structural safety for aging infrastructure.
• The findings support improved non-destructive testing and structural health monitoring strategies.