Sensors & Transducers (May 2008)
Online Corrosion and Force Monitoring for Inner Containment Concrete Structures
Abstract
Corrosion of steel in concrete reduces the service life and durability of concrete structures. It is a worldwide problem, which causes heavy losses to the economy of the country. The durability of concrete structures primarily depends on the condition of the embedded steel in concrete, apart from any deterioration that concrete may undergo. In general potential surveys are carried out on concrete structures to know about the condition of steel. Most of these measurements in the field are carried out manually and the data obtained are analyzed. This offline measurements leads to an error in the data collected, time consuming and involvement of huge man power. Online corrosion monitoring eliminates such errors in the measurements and improves the accuracy of the data collected from humanly inaccessible regions of a structure. To mitigate corrosion prior to significant degradation and optimize the performance of such concrete structures, various sensors have been used to detect the corrosion and to provide early warning. To assess the condition of the embedded steel, the sensors of the probe are connected to a computer through specialized data acquisition hardware. The computer controls the data acquisition using suitable user friendly software that calculates the corrosion rate at prescribed intervals for continuous monitoring. New types of corrosion sensors and its mechanism in real time measurements are described. Online analysis of data for corrosion and force monitoring is described in this paper.
