António C. Azevedo – författare

This book discusses the main mechanical features of masonry buildings and the peculiarities that affect their structural behaviour. It also examines technical information regarding accidents that have occurred in recent years in the Metropolitan Region of Recife, along with the historical records of these events, followed by indications of the causes for the collapse.The book offers extensive experimental results that make it possible to identify the contribution of several mortar rendering layers to the load capacity of the tested specimens. Lastly, it explores the factors that influenced the load capacity of the tested specimens.

This book offers a new calculation procedure of the structural behavior of grouped layout of silos, easy to use and with satisfactory responses. Groups of reinforced concrete silos are structures commonly used in the food industry, where it is usually necessary to separate the storage of different types and sources of grain.

The knowledge of moisture migration inside building materials and construction building components is decisive for the way they behave when in use.

This work presents an extensive experimental characterisation of two different ceramic brick blocks with different interface, at different heights, during the drying process. First, a laboratory characterization of the building material used (ceramic bricks and different mortars) is presented, showing their hygrothermal, mechanical and thermal properties, namely, bulk porosity and density, water vapour permeability, capillary absorption, retention curve, moisture diffusivity as a function of moisture content and thermal conductivity. Moreover, the moisture transfer in multi-layered systems was analysed in detail taking into account the interface contact between the building elements.

This book discusses the effects of soluble mineral salts on ceramic brick masonry walls in Petrolina, a city in Pernambuco, Brazil, located 780 km from the ocean.

This book offers a complete diagnosis of concrete samples collected from a pile cap block of residential buildings affected by internal swelling reactions.

This book offers a complete diagnosis of concrete samples collected from a pile cap block of residential buildings affected by internal swelling reactions.

This book discusses the behaviour of isolated concrete bottle-shaped struts affected by internal expansion reactions (ISR). For that purpose, the numerical modelling of damaged concrete was performed using the Concrete Damaged Plasticity Model (CDPM) implemented in ABAQUS and validated the model through Sankovich's tests. A procedure to automatically obtain the concrete plasticity and damage parameters, essential for CDPM, was developed in Matlab. The inputs were the characteristic compressive strength of the concrete, the equivalent length of the finite element mesh and the ratio between the plastic and inelastic compressive strains. The results showed that the CDPM could represent the load-bearing mechanisms of isolated concrete bottle-shaped struts for a range of several stress levels to which these elements may be subjected in the panels investigated. The numerical simulations for different expansion levels consistently captured the expected damage profile of the panels and theload corresponding to the formation of the first crack, the estimated crack opening, and the ultimate load. For the panels investigated, the reduction observed in the failure load reached values close to 70%, the increase of the tensile plastic deformation was more than 60%, and the maximum crack opening can reach an increase of 113% when compared with those observed experimentally in panels without internal swelling reactions The book also offers a systematic review of the current state of knowledge and it is a valuable resource for scientists, students, practitioners, and lecturers in various scientific and engineering disciplines, namely, civil and materials engineering, as well as and other interested parties.

This book discusses the behaviour of isolated concrete bottle-shaped struts affected by internal expansion reactions (ISR). For that purpose, the numerical modelling of damaged concrete was performed using the Concrete Damaged Plasticity Model (CDPM) implemented in ABAQUS and validated the model through Sankovich's tests. A procedure to automatically obtain the concrete plasticity and damage parameters, essential for CDPM, was developed in Matlab. The inputs were the characteristic compressive strength of the concrete, the equivalent length of the finite element mesh and the ratio between the plastic and inelastic compressive strains. The results showed that the CDPM could represent the load-bearing mechanisms of isolated concrete bottle-shaped struts for a range of several stress levels to which these elements may be subjected in the panels investigated. The numerical simulations for different expansion levels consistently captured the expected damage profile of the panels and theload corresponding to the formation of the first crack, the estimated crack opening, and the ultimate load. For the panels investigated, the reduction observed in the failure load reached values close to 70%, the increase of the tensile plastic deformation was more than 60%, and the maximum crack opening can reach an increase of 113% when compared with those observed experimentally in panels without internal swelling reactions The book also offers a systematic review of the current state of knowledge and it is a valuable resource for scientists, students, practitioners, and lecturers in various scientific and engineering disciplines, namely, civil and materials engineering, as well as and other interested parties.

This book presents the numerical results of the use of the chemical model to analyse the advancement of the reaction and the mechanical model to simulate creep and shrinkage phenomena in COMSOL Multiphysics®, as a way to reassess concrete structures suffering from those mechanisms. Both models were implemented separately to evaluate their responses and compare them with the theoretical results and experimental benchmarks presented in the literature. The numerical simulation results showed excellent agreement with the experimental results data, with maximum disagreement not exceeding 10%, indicating that the implementation of the developed numerical models behaved very efficiently.