Concrete early-age strength monitoring using embedded piezoelectric transducers

Abstract

At early ages of concrete structures, strength monitoring is important to determine the structures' readiness for service. Piezoelectric-based strength monitoring methods provide an innovative experimental approach to conduct concrete strength monitoring at early ages. In this paper, piezoelectric transducers in the form of 'smart aggregates' are embedded into the concrete specimen during casting. Piezoceramic materials can be used as actuators to generate high frequency vibrating waves, which propagate within concrete structures; meanwhile, they can also be used as sensors to detect the waves. The smart aggregate is a one cubic inch, pre-cast concrete block with a wired, embedded PZT (lead zirconate titanate, a type of piezoceramic) patch. The strength development of concrete structures is monitored by observing the development of harmonic response amplitude from the embedded piezoelectric sensor at early ages. From experimental results, the amplitude of the harmonic response decreases with increasing concrete strength. The concrete strength increases at a fast rate during the first few days and at a decreasing rate after the first week. Concordantly, the amplitude of the harmonic response from the piezoelectric sensor drops rapidly for the first week and continues to drop slowly as hydration proceeds, matching the development of the concrete strength at early ages. Concrete is heterogeneous and anisotropic, which makes it difficult to analyze mathematically. Fuzzy logic has the advantage of conducting analysis without requiring a mathematical model. In this paper, a fuzzy logic system is trained to correlate the harmonic amplitude with the concrete strength based on the experimental data. The experimental results show that the concrete strength estimated by the trained fuzzy correlation system matches the experimental strength data. The proposed piezoelectric-based monitoring method has the potential to be applied to strength monitoring of concrete structures at early ages.