Marc Quiertant

This study aims to analyze the individual and combined chemical attacks of sulfate and chloride ions on cementitious materials and assess the efficiency of some selected additives (fly ash, blast furnace slag, and metakaolin) in countering this combined attack. This research is conducted in the context of construction in marine environments, where reinforced concrete structures are often subject to significant challenges due to early exposure to sulfate and chloride ions. This early exposure results in concrete expansion, cracking, and, ultimately, the corrosion of steel reinforcements. Nevertheless, the interaction between sulfate ions, chloride ions, and the cementitious matrix remains poorly understood. Previous research has drawn conflicting conclusions, with some suggesting that sulfate ions mitigate chloride attacks, while others have come to the opposite conclusion. During this study, experimental investigations were conducted by immersing powders obtained from crushed ordinary Portland cement (CEM I) paste specimens, as well as binary, ternary, and quaternary blends, in sulfate, chloride, and sulfate–chloride solutions over the course of 25 days at an early age. Results from different characterization techniques (thermogravimetric analysis, Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, etc.) indicate that chloride ions delay the formation of ettringite, while the presence of sulfate ions accelerates the chloride attack by limiting the formation of Friedel’s salt. The Mercury Intrusion Porosimetry test confirmed these results by showing a pronounced increase in specimens’ porosity after exposure to solely sulfate after 25 days, compared to the ones exposed to both sulfate and chloride ions. Furthermore, the incorporation of multiple additives, particularly in ternary and quaternary blends, demonstrates the enhanced durability of the studied samples. This was confirmed by a Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy analysis, which indicated a delayed ettringite formation in these mixtures. This delay was further affirmed by the complete depletion of sulfate ions in the sulfate solutions upon contact with powders derived from the 100% CEM I paste.

The modal parameters of structures, and in particular their mode shapes, are generally determined based on the measurement of accelerometers or laser vibrometers. However, these sensors do not allow the performance of full-field measurements. In this study, the free vibration of a beam triggered by a shock is investigated using a high-speed camera with high image definition. With the help of digital image correlation (DIC), the beam displacement fields are deduced from the images. To analyse the DIC measurement quality, different tests and analyses are performed. First, the systematic errors and uncertainties in the DIC calculation for a simple translation are analysed considering different speckles. Then, tests on two configurations of a vibrating beam are filmed and full-field displacement measurements are computed. The modal parameters of the beam are deduced from these measurements using a continuous wavelet transform method. Particular care was taken to adapt the method to the post-processing of the numerous and noisy signals obtained for these experiments. All the steps of the post-processing are detailed in this paper. Finally, the modal parameters obtained with the proposed method are compared with those obtained in a more classical way using accelerometers and from the beam theory. In particular, the comparison of the signal-to-noise ratio of the different measurement methods is discussed.