On the crack characterization of reinforced concrete structures: Experimental and data-driven numerical study

Abstract In today’s rapid infrastructure development, reinforced concrete (RC) construction accounts for majority of the total residential, commercial and industrial projects. These RC structures, once constructed, deteriorates significantly during their service life. The deterioration of RC structural elements increases mainly with the ageing and sustained loading on the structure and depends on various parameters. One of the primary parameter to access the serviceability of an RC structure is cracking. In this work, an experimental and a numerical study is carried out on the flexural crack behaviour of reinforced concrete beam members. The experimental investigation is focused on the effect of flexural crack by varying the percentage of tensile steel on beam sections. Later, a computer vision-based data-driven numerical tool for crack representation and quantification is developed and validated based on the real-time spatio-temporal video surveillance data of the flexural testing on beams. The developed numerical tool based on the experimental study can be used by the structural designers and practitioners for a robust serviceability-based design of reinforced concrete members and systems.