Damage Assessment &

Evaluation of
Structures

HarRajdeep Singh
11500916 [C114]
Dept. of Civil Engineering
Objectives of
Inspection
Short term aims
• Safe use of streets adjacent to
damaged buildings
• Safe occupation of buildings for :
• Continued use, especially emergency facilities
• Minimization of impact on commercial activity
• Minimization of displacement of people
• Assessment of need for temporary
works such as shoring
Long term aims
• Cost of damage estimates
determining the aid and resources
required for permanent recovery
• Obtaining engineering, scientific &
insurance data to improve disaster
mitigation measures
• Monitoring changes in the concrete
with the passage of time
Methodology
of Damage
Assessment
Scale of Damage
Assessment
Tests employed
• Non-destructive Tests
• Intrusive Tests
• Destructive Tests
 Non-destructive Testing
• It is a form of testing to be carried out on various construction members
and materials without causing any permanent damage to them.
• Does not permanently alter the article being tested.
• It can be used for both new and old structures
Typical situations where non-destructive testing may be useful are:
• confirming or negating doubt concerning the workmanship
involved in batching, mixing, placing, compacting or curing of
concrete
• monitoring of strength development in relation to formwork
removal, prestressing, load application or similar purpose.
• location and determination of the extent of cracks, voids,
honeycombing and similar defects within a concrete structure
• determining the position, quantity or condition of reinforcement
• confirming or locating suspected deterioration of concrete
resulting from such factors as overloading, fatigue, explosion,
environmental effects
• assessing the potential durability of the concrete
Various NDT methods

Rebound
Hammer & Basic Tests
Penetration
Techniques

Thermal
Radiography
Methods

Stress
Electromagnetic wave
Techniques propagation
methods
NDT methods (Overview)

Rebound Hammer &

Penetration Techniques Basic Tests
• It consists essentially of a metal plunger, These are conducted by visual inspection. It
one end of which is held against the includes :
concrete surface while the free end is
struck by a spring-loaded mass which a) Key Test b) Push Test c) Spray Test
rebounds to a point on a graduated
• It can be used for internal and external
scale. The amount of rebound increases
surface inspection of a variety of
with increase in concrete strength for a
equipment types, including storage tanks,
particular concrete mix.
pressure vessels, piping, and other
• It measures the surface hardness of equipment.
concrete and provides an estimation of
• Cost-effective test
surface compressive strength, uniformity
and quality of concrete.
• Schmidt Rebound Hammers are most
commonly used.
NDT Methods
Thermal Methods
• An infrared scanning camera is used to
detect variations in infrared radiation
output of a surface. Thermal gradients
arise because of difference in surface
temperature between sound and unsound
concrete.
• It can be used for detecting delamination,
heat loss and moisture movement through
concrete elements especially for flat
surfaces.
• It is an expensive technique. It is very
sensitive to thermal interference from other
heat sources.
Radiography
• A radioactive isotope directs a beam at
a member and an X ray photographic
plate is held against the back face.
Gamma radiation attenuates when
passing through a building component.
• This technique is quite established for
examination of steel members. It can be
used for locating internal cracks, voids
and variations in density of materials,
grouting of post-tensioned construction as
well as locating the position and
condition of reinforcing steel in concrete.
NDT Methods
Electromagnetic Techniques
• The basic principle is that the presence of
steel affects magnetic field. An
electromagnetic search probe is swept over
the surface of the concrete under test. The
presence of reinforcement within the range
of the instrument is shown by movement of
the indicator needle.
• It is used for determining the presence,
location and depth of rebars in concrete
and masonry components. It is moderately
easy to operate. However, some training or
experience is required to interpret the
results.
• It can be conducted by magnetic reluctance
or electromagnetic current method.
Stress Wave propagation method
• It involves propagation of stress waves through
concrete.
• Stress waves are created either by pulses
generated using ultrasonic transducers, or by
impact.
• Various techniques :
a) Sounding Technique
In this technique, sound is created either by
impact of hammer or chain dragging. When
concrete or masonary surface is good, a ringing
sound is created else a drum-like sound is
produced.
It is used in steel members to check the tightness of
rivets and bolts.
NDT Methods
b) Ultrasonic Pulse Velocity
• Voltage pulses are generated and
transformed into wave bursts of mechanical
energy by the transmitting transducer. A
receiving transducer is coupled to the
specimen at a known distance to measure
the interval between the transmission and
reception of a pulse.
• Determination of the variability and quality
of concrete by measuring pulse velocity.
Using transmission method, the extent of
such defects such as voids, honeycombing,
cracks and segregation may be
determined. This technique is also useful
when examining fire damaged concrete.
c) Impact Echo/Pulse Echo
• Pulsed compressional waves are induced in
materials and those reflected back are
detected by a hand-held accelerometer.
This is connected to a signal processor that
integrates the signal and displays it on an
oscilloscope.
• This method has been recently developed
for quality control and integrity pile testing.
It can detect the type and location of
defects or inconsistency of the pile.
Application of NDT
methods in Nutshell
Intrusive Tests/Semi-Destructive Tests

• These tests are needed when the NDT are limited in their accuracy.
• This causes some damage to the structure thus needs repair.

Prism Test – It is a laboratory test used to calculate

the compressive strength of a masonary prism.
Prism can be obtained from site or manufactured in
lab as a model.

Coupon Test – The coupons from

In-situ Permeability Test – Damage
can be assessed by introducing water
into the cavities.
rebars or members of steel buildings
are taken to test the yield strength and
ultimate tensile strength. Corrosion
rate can also be determined by testing
the loss of weight per unit time.
SDT Tests
Flat Jack Test- It is used to find the
in-situ compressive strength of
masonary wall, deformability
properties of masonary and shear
strength of masonary joints.

Core Test – In this, a cylindrical core is

usually removed from the structural
member. It is used to study the
compressive strength , durability, w-c
ratio.

In-situ shear test – It is used to

measure the actual shear strength of
mortar joint of a masonary wall.
Destructive Tests
• Tests are carried out to the specimen's failure, in order to understand a specimen's
performance or material behaviour under different loads.
• Destructive testing is most suitable, and economic, for objects which will be mass-
produced, as the cost of destroying a small number of specimens is negligible.
• Analyzing and documenting the destructive failure mode is often accomplished using
a high-speed camera recording continuously (movie-loop) until the failure is detected.

Testing of mechanical properties of materials

using UTM ( Universal testing machine )
 Tensile Testing
 Bend Testing
 Compressive testing
Hardness testing
Impact testing
References

• https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330704879_Locating_Hidden_Elements_in_W
alls_of_Cultural_Heritage_Buildings_by_Using_Infrared_Thermography
• Handbook on seismic retrofit of buildings
• https://www.slideshare.net/maadaswamyuMaadaswam/non-destructive-testing-in-civil-
engineering
• https://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/Publications/PDF/TCS-17_web.pdf
• https://www.slideshare.net/binay2020/post-damage-assessment
• http://nceg.uop.edu.pk/workshop-17to31mar-
05/Slides/day10/01_falak/Damage%20Assessment%20Methodology.pdf
• Ismail, M.P., Selection of suitable NDT methods for building inspection, GCoMSE2017, IOP
Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 271. 2017, 012085 doi:10.1088/1757-
899X/271/1/012085.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGQnbwxPiFA
References
• IS 11216 – 1985
• IS 1608 – 2005
• http://www.qualimations.com/qms.ppt
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destructive_testing
• http://www.iitk.ac.in/ce/test/Masonry_PrismFlatJackHammerPulseTests.pdf
• IS 5529 (part 2) – 2006
• https://www.nde-ed.org/EducationResources/educationresource.php
• https://www.academia.edu/4010547/Wave_Propagation_Concrete_NDT_Techniques_for_Evalu
ation_of_Structures_and_Materials
Questions
& Comments