Moisture behavior inside building materials treated with silane water repellent

The application of penetrating water repellent sometimes accelerates degradation of building materials, especially when there are water sources inside such as ground water. A series of experiments using the gamma-ray attenuation method and numerical analysis corresponding to the experiments were performed to reveal the moisture behavior in building materials treated with silane water repellent and to develop a proper numerical model for the repellent layer. The experimental and calculation results show a large difference in water content between the repellent layer and the substrate, which may cause the abovementioned problems. (c) 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.