MODELING THE FRACTURE OF CONCRETE - THE COHESIVE CRACK

This paper shows the ability of the cohesive crack model to predict reasonably well the behaviour of concrete specimens. To demonstrate this two very different examples are considered. The first is an engineering problem related to the breakage of precase concrete piles; it is shown that the cohesive crack model points to the relevant parameters and suggests ways to improve the behaviour of the concrete. The second example analyses the well known effect of size on the modulus of rupture when measured during the three point bending of beams. The predictions using a simple cohesive model with bilinear softening are very good. The present work shows how this model not only predicts accurately the maximum loads for different geometries and sizes but also is able to make reasonably good predictions of load and displacement at any instant throughout the test.