A Review Paper on Damage Detection in Reinforced Concrete Beam Using Acoustic Emission Technique

Evaluating the integrity of concrete structures is an essential procedure to ensure structural safety and durability. Structural assessment is the integral part of civil engineering When any structure is to be constructed it should be designed for 20-30 years lifespan. But after some year structural assessment is required for the structure. Structures can deteriorate in service as a result of heavy loads, fatigue and aging of the structures. Serviceability & performance of RC structure is hampered because of deterioration of concrete such as corrosion, poor construction aging, overloading, chemical reaction, natural disasters (Earthquake). Effect on structural capacity and durability because of damage propagation is time dependent process. Deterioration of existing concrete structures has raised the need for advanced non-destructive testing (NDT) techniques to determine the current structural state of the members and to assist in the evaluation of repairs. Non-destructive testing (NDT) is needed for localizing and characterizing the growing damage in existing structures and also for quality control of new structures. Visual inspection is a commonly used method however it is not suitable for early detection of damage and very dependent on the experience of the inspector. NDT is also required for testing new structures to ascertain safety and serviceability of the members prior to service. Among all the NDT test Acoustic Emission (AE) technique is used for real time damage detection in structure. Damage severity of reinforced concrete (RC) structure can be diagnosed using acoustic emission (AE) technique. With the help of AE technique corrosion can be detect in the structure. Detecting real time damage, locating the crack propagation in beam sample & with the help of RA value and Avg Frequency crack classification will be easier. Availability of data of Cumulative AE hits and Amplitude of signals help to detect corrosion in beam sample will be easy, these are the expected outcomes of study. Due to use of AE system periodic structural assessment will be automatically eliminated and it will help to reduce assessment cost. Nowadays AE system were already installed on massive structure such as bridges, dams, steel buildings etc. to detect real time damage and to rectify it on time.