The subject of this research area is the growth of cracks in concrete beams and slabs, with or without reinforcement, subject to bending and normal force.
The aim of this research is to develop simple models for the influence of cracking on the bending stiffness of concrete members such as beams, columns and slabs; furthermore, to be able to make consistent predictions of the cracking of such members, in terms of crack width, crack depth and de-bonding of reinforcement.
The modeling approach is based on adaptive cracked hinge models for beams which are used for determining average moment-curvature relationships as functions of the normal force. These averaged “material models” may then be implemented in beam and plate finite elements.
This approach allows for consistent FE-modeling of reinforced concrete structures dominated by flexural behavior. Although the analysis is non-linear, it is efficient compared to full 3D modeling.