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Essay: Performance of concrete under fire exposure

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  • Subject area(s): Engineering essays
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  • Published: 7 November 2015*
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  • Words: 674 (approx)
  • Number of pages: 3 (approx)

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INTRODUCTION
1.1. General
Humans every day sees strange disasters around the world such floods, deadly diseases, environmental pollutions and building burning. Buildings exposed to direct fires for periods long enough to deteriorate concrete membersdifficultto be completely rehabilitated again.
High strength concrete has diverse strength loss when subjected to thermal loads and shows a higher tendency to spall than conventional concrete. The rise in temperature causes normal thermal expansion in the cement paste which is accompanied with shrinkage due water loses from the pasteand aggregates, instantaneously continue expanding, differing and restricting shrinkage of the paste. Tensile stresses in the concrete are produced by volumetric changes whichin turn, weaken the paste aggregate bond and finally cause fractures.
Burning one of the serious potential risk to most building, since concrete most part of its construction. Concrete structure behavior in fire conditions is normally governed by the properties of the constituent materials, therefore it endures considerable volumetric changes which often is not coincident with other constituentof its structure. This unfavorable behavior is seldom maximized by using unsuitable cooling methodology causing a complete concrete deterioration and buildings collapse.
Performance of concrete members under fire exposure is of most important in securing constructions and prevent threads to neighboring structures nor to the public.
Although, concrete represent not a good conductor to heat and capable to endure high temperatures, it does not mean that high temperature or fire, never affect concrete. High temperature may causechanges in physical and mechanical propertiesof concrete. Briefly, concrete exposed to fire flame should be resistive and secure for time enough to make safety arrangements and building evacuation before building collapse.
1.2. Research Significance:
Information about high-strength concretes members exposedto high temperatures phases is still needed to be deeply studiedand evaluated. Experimental work indicates that HSC mixes have more sensitivity to fire flame exposure than conventional mixes.
A large number of buildings around the world is destroyed completely after they are extinguished by water cooling methodology without knowing the reasons behind. Is this because the concrete deterioration after exposing to high temperature? Or because the method of cooling?
1.3. Objectives of The Work
The aim of this experimental study is to evaluate the effect of fire flame of different temperature phases on the mechanical properties of HSC.The research is aimed to:-
1- Produce high strength concrete (HSC) mixes of strength ranging between (60-80MPa) with the addition of nano-metakaoline and polypropylene (PP) Fiber shopping to manufacture concrete parts characterized with high mechanical performance.
2- Study the effect of direct fire flame burning on the mechanical properties of the manufactured concretenamely; compressive strength (Comp. St.), splitting tensile strength (Spt. St.), flexural strength (Flex. St.), elastic modulus (EM) and ultra sonic pulse velocity (U.P.V)
3- Evaluate the optimum cooling methodology among many on a residual mechanical strength of concrete samples.
4- Optimize the replacement of dolomite as coarse aggregate instead of gravelaggregate in manufacturing of thermal concrete mixes.
5- Evaluate the influence of polypropylene fibers on the mechanical properties of exposed concrete samples to direct fire flame burning.
6- Exploring a heat distribution over an exposed concrete samples by theoretical (numerical analysis) and practical (measured) simulation methodologies.
7- Studying the effect of a pozzolanic material (Nono-metakaolin) in the production of thermal High strength concrete (HSC) mixes
1.4. Research Methodology
The work in this research has many parts, they are:-
1.4.1. Official Work
A- The official work includes materials and additions assessment and collection.
B- Designing high strength concrete (HSC) mixes depending uponIraqi and ASTM Standards. They are of eight types and undertaken in details elsewhere.
1.4.2 Laboratorial Work
A- Building a burner of special type (made of insulated bricks with electrical and gas connections) for exposing concrete samples to direct fire flame.
B- Preparation of concrete samples of different mixes, curing, aeration, burning and testing as a sequential work.
1.4.3 Optimization Study
Since the work is too huge with large amount of data, therefore the optimization study of the results becomes necessary. The main goal of this optimality is electing the optimum mix among others depending on their resulting mechanical properties.

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