Pathology of Building Materials in Historic Buildings. Relationship Between Laboratory Testing and Infrared Thermography

Abstract

Study of historic buildings requires a pathology analysis of the construction materials used in order to define their conservation state. Usually we can find capillary moisture, salt crystalli-zation or density differences by deterioration. Sometimes this issue is carried out by destructive testing which determine materials’ physical and chemical characteristics. However, they are unfavorable regarding the building’s integrity, and they are sometimes difficult to implement. This paper presents a technique using infrared thermography to analyze the existing pathology and has the advantage of being able to diagnose inaccessible areas in buildings. The results obtained by this technique have been compared with those obtained in the laboratory, in order to validate this study and thus to extrapolate the methodology to other buildings and materials.

Keywords

• limestone
• decay
• physical properties
• thermal analysis