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In historical reinforced concrete buildings, square ribbed rebars, round ribbed rebars and square twisted rebars are the main steel rebars. In order to determine the corrosion behavior of such historical steel rebars, we investigated the deterioration mechanisms of steel rebars in historical architecture in simulated concrete pore solution using various electrochemical tests and microscopic examination of corrosion products. The hot-rolled ribbed bar (HRB)335 rebars used in modern buildings were used as a control sample. The results demonstrated that the corrosion process of the historical rebars was similar to that of HRB335 rebars. Nevertheless, there were some differences in the chemical composition, microstructure, passive film characteristics, critical chloride ion concentration, and corrosion products. In the passivation stage, the stability order of the passive film generated on the surface of the rebars was as follows: square ribbed rebars > square twisted rebars > HRB335 rebars > round ribbed rebars. In the Cl− corrosion stage, the damaging effect order of Cl− on the passive film is square ribbed rebars > HRB335 rebars > square twisted rebars > round ribbed rebars. The critical chloride ion concentration was between 0.5% and 2.0% by weight. The corrosion products were mainly Fe2O3 , α -FeOOH, γ -FeOOH. β -FeOOH, and protective Fe3O4. The corrosion products of HRB335 rebars were mainly nonprotective crystallized FeOOH with various morphologies. The results of this study provide a scientific foundation for the conservation design and residual life prediction of historic reinforced concrete buildings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the pore structure and gas permeability of river sand concrete and manufactured sand concrete (mixed with various stone powders) are examined under dry and wet conditions. First, the pore structure of concrete was tested using the mercury-in-pressure (MIP), hydrostatic balance (HB), and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) methods. Second, the gas permeability of concrete was measured using the quasi-stationary flow method. Finally, a numerical model was developed based on the relationship between the pore structure and gas permeability. The results indicated that the gas permeability of dry concrete has a quadratic linear relationship with the porosity and volumetric characteristic pore size. The pore structure of partially water-saturated concrete can be corrected using a correction factor and the relaxation rate of the dry material. Finally, a random hierarchical bundle model using the HB–NMR method is proposed. The maximum relative deviation between the predicted and experimental values is 48.28%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Structural reliability analysis is of critical importance for ensuring the safety of many engineering systems. This paper proposes an efficient structural reliability analysis method based on stochastic configuration networks (SCNs), which is constructed by learning the real performance function of the structure. In this article, two kinds of innovative surrogate models of performance function are constructed based on the trained SCNs. To improve the approximation accuracy and efficiency of SCNs for complex high-dimensional performance functions, the improved high-dimensional model representation is applied to decompose the multivariate function into a combination of several low-dimensional functions. An innovative SCN-based learning strategy is proposed to simultaneously approximate all the low-dimensional component functions. By performing Monte Carlo Simulation on the established SCN-based surrogate models, we can successfully evaluate the failure probability of many complex multi-dimensional engineering structures. The proposed SCN-based reliability analysis method provides a powerful tool for estimating the failure probability of complex multi-dimensional engineering structures. Effectiveness of the proposed method in terms of accuracy and efficiency as well as stability is demonstrated through several numerical experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an abstract concept, ‘location error’ in is considered to be an important element with great difficult to understand and apply. The paper designs and develops an instrument to measure the location error. The location error is affected by different position methods and reference selection. So we choose position element by rotating the disk. The tiny movement transfers by grating ruler and programming by PLC can show the error on text display, which also helps students understand the position principle and related concepts of location error. After comparing measurement results with theoretical calculations and analyzing the measurement accuracy, the paper draws a conclusion that the teaching aid owns reliability and a promotion of high value.