NON-DESTRUCTIVE TESTS

ON CONCRETE
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. INTRODUCTION
2. NON DESTRUCTIVE TESTING IN ALL LIFE
CYCLE PHASES
3. IMPORTANCE OF NDT ON CONCRETE
4. DIFFERENT TYPES OF NDT
5. REBOUND HAMMER TEST
6. ULTRASONIC PULSE VELOCITY TEST
7. CONCLUSION

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WHAT IS NDT ?

 NDT is a branch of Engineering concerned with all methods

of detecting flaws in materials or an object with modern

techniques that doesn’t affect its the future usefulness.

 Inspection without interfering products final use.

 NDT can be used in any stage of product’s design,

manufacturing, including selection of materials, quality

assurance and production.

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NON-DESTRUCTIVE TESTING IN ALL
LIFE CYCLE PHASES

 Construction phase.

 Operations phase.

 Renovation phase.

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CONSTRUCTION PHASE
 Quality control during construction phase.
 Defects we often find during this phases are defective
grouting, cavities, change of reinforcements etc.
 Defects or lack of quality are found during the construction
phase, can be fixed at a later stage to avoid costly
maintenance costs.

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OPERATIONS PHASE

 Structural conditions and failure analysis during operations

phase.
 NDT can assess hidden harmful features such as cavities,
delamination, corrosion etc.
 Determining the cause of damage or assessing the
structures condition while estimating durability and
renovation

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RENOVATION PHASE
 NDT plays a major role in avoiding the misinterpreted
structural overview.
 Lack of knowledge may lead to collapse of the structure
during renovation process.
 To understand actual condition and ability of structure to
carry additional loads.

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IMPORTANCE OF NDT ON CONCRETE
 To check whether concrete is hardened properly and gained
its designed strength.
 NDT methods are used to evaluate concrete properties by
assessing strength and other properties such as corrosion,
cracking and void.
 To know the nature and extent of deterioration of concrete,
without damaging the existing structure, NDT techniques
were used.
 NDT is important for evaluation of both new and old
structures. For new structure main application is to
determine the quality of material, and for existing structure
is usually related to assessment of structural integrity.

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SITUATIONS WHERE NDT USED
 Quality control of pre-cast unit or construction in-situ.
 Removing uncertainties about the acceptability of the
material
 Conforming the workmanship involved in batching, mixing,
placing or curing of concrete.
 Location and determination of extent of cracks, void,
honeycombing and similar defects in concrete structure.
 Determining the position, quantity or condition of
reinforcement.
 Monitoring long term changes in concrete properties. 9
DIFFERENT TYPES OF NDT
 Rebound Hammer Test
 Ultrasonic Pulse velocity test

 Rebar Locators

 Penetration Tests

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NON-DESTRUCTIVE TESTING
METHODS OF CONCRETE
 SCHMIDT REBOUND HAMMER TEST (IS
13311 PART 2; 1992)
 ULTRA SONIC PULSE VELOCITY TEST (IS
13311 PART 1; 1992)

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1.REBOUND HAMMER TEST

Schmidt Rebound Cross section of Rebound

Hammer Hammer
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REBOUND HAMMER TEST
Fundamental Principle
 Schmidt rebound hammer test is basically a
surface hardness test.
 Surface hardness of the concrete is
correlated with compressive strength by
empirical relations.
 It works on the principle that the rebound of
an elastic mass depends on the hardness of
the surface against which the mass strikes..

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REBOUND HAMMER TEST
Rebound Hammer

 The weight of the hammer is about 1.8 kg

and can be used for both in laboratory and in
the field.
 The main components include the outer
body, the plunger, the hammer mass and the 14

spring.
REBOUND HAMMER TEST
 The rebound distance is measured along the
scale marked from 10 to 100.
 There are different types of rebound
hammers are available such as Type N, Type
NR, Type L, Type LR, Type M and Type P etc.
 Type N is used commonly for ordinary
buildings and bridges.

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REBOUND HAMMER TEST
Specifications of Type N Rebound Hammer
 Measuring Range : 10-70 N/mm²

 Impact energy : 2.207 N-m

 Case dimensions : 140 x 114 x 324

 Net weight : 1.6 kg

 IS Code : IS 13311 (Part 2) 1992

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REBOUND HAMMER TEST
Test Procedure

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TEST PROCEDURE
 The hammer pushed hard against the concrete until the
latch connects the hammer mass to the plunger.
 The plunger is held perpendicular to the surface of concrete
and pushed against.
 movement extends the spring holding the mass to the body
and the extension reaches its maximum.
 the latch releases and the mass pulled towards the surface.
 The mass hits the shoulder of plunger rod and rebounds
because the rod is pushed against concrete.
 During rebound the slide indicator travels and reaches
maximum,which indicates rebound number.
 Rebound number is read from the scale on the body of
hammer
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IS 13311 (PART 2) 1992

 For testing, smooth, clean and dry surface is

to be selected
 Point of impact should be at least 20 mm
away from any edge or shape discontinuity
 For taking measurements, the rebound
hammer should be held at right angles
 Rebound hammer test is conducted around
all the points of observation on all accessible
faces of the structural element. Around each
point of observation six readings of rebound
indices are taken and average of these
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readings is taken as the rebound index for
the point of observation.
CALIBRATION CURVE OF A SCHMIDT
HAMMER

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INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS
Average Quality of Concrete
Rebound Number

>40 Very good hard layer

30-40 Good layer

20-30 Fair

<20 Very poor

0 Delaminated

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ADVANTAGES AND LIMITATIONS OF
REBOUND HAMMER TEST
Advantages
 Relatively simple to use

 Inexpensive equipment makes the test cost effective

 Operational range of test is M10 to M70

Limitations
 Gives only surface hardness
 Results are unrelated to the properties of the interior
since the readings are taken on the surface
 Surface irregularities affect the results
 Gravity effects influence the test

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 2.ULTRA SONIC PULSE VELOCITY
TEST

• This method also does not cause any damage to the surface of concrete .
• UPV Test can be used for the evaluation of interior bulk of the concrete.

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ULTRA SONIC PULSE VELOCITY
TEST
Fundamental
   Principle
 The pulses generated by transducers transmit to the
concrete using liquid coupling materials such as
grease, cellulose etc. it undergoes multiple reflections
at the boundaries.
 The stress waves which include longitudinal and shear
waves, hence generated, pass through the inside of
concrete.
 Time to reach signal at receiver measured end
velocity is calculated, from which the quality is
deduced.

V velocity of pulse 24
L path length , T time to reach pulse at receiver end
FLOW DIAGRAM

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DETERMINATION OF PULSE
VELOCITY
Transducer arrangement
3 types of arrangements.
 Opposite faces (Direct transmission)

 Adjacent faces (Semi direct transmission)

 Same face (Indirect Transmission)

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UPV TEST
 Generally the transducers should be in the
range of 20-150 KHz.
 Velocity of Ultra Sonic pulse mainly depends
up on the elastic properties of the material.
 Higher the velocities are obtained when
quality of concrete in terms of density,
homogeneity and uniformity is good.
 In case poorer quality, lower velocities are
obtained. It may be due to cracks, void, non-
uniformity etc.
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APPLICATIONS OF UPV TEST
 Determination of uniformity of concrete.
 Measurement of changes occurring to the
properties of concrete with respect to the
time.
 Pulse velocity measurements made on
concrete members can be used for its quality
control

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INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS
Determination of Quality of concrete

Pulse Velocity Concrete Quality or Grading

Km/sec  

Above 4.5 Excellent

3.5-4.5 Good

3.0-3.5 Medium

Below 3.5 Doubtful

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IS 13311 PART 1;1992 Table 2
INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS
Determination of Dynamic Young’s
Modulus

E=ƥ(1+µ)(1-2µ²)v²/(1-µ)
where
E Dynamic Young’s Modulus of Elasticity in
Mpa
ƥ density in kg/mᶟ
V Pulse velocity in m/s
µ Poisson’s ratio
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ADVANTAGES AND LIMITATIONS
Advantages
 Ultra sonic testing equipment provides faster and
accurate results.
 Test can be conducted without any damage to
structure.
 Cost efficient and save time.
 Test can perform even the accessibility is to only one
side of concrete.
Limitations
 High degree of operator skill and integrity needed.
 Miss leading of pulses can results in unnecessary
repairing works. 31
CONCLUSION
 Two of the most used non-destructive testing methods for
the assessment of concrete are ultrasonic pulse velocity
(UPV) test and rebound hammer (RH) test.
 UPV and RH techniques were discussed with their limitations
and their use.
 Each of the two methods has a high degree of applicability,
delivering results close to the real ones.
 NDT of concrete was found to be gaining increasing
acceptance as means of evaluating the strength, uniformity,
durability and other properties of existing concrete
structures.
 The simplicity and speed of the test contrast with several
drawbacks which can mislead to useless results.

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REFERENCES

 Miguel C.S.Nepomuceno: Non-destructive Tests on

Concrete, Article July 2002
 Malek Jedidi, Anis Abroug, Bedis Moalla and Omrane
Benjeddou:International Journal of Architecture,
Engineering and Construction, Vol 6, No 1, March
2017.
 Duna Samson, Omoniyi, Tope Moses:International
Journal of Engineering Science Invention ISSN
(Online): 2319 – 6734, ISSN (Print): 2319 – 6726,
www.ijesi.org Volume 3 Issue 9 ǁ September 2014.
 IS 13311 Part 1 1992

 IS 13311 Part 2 1992

 Guidebook on NON-DESTRUCTIVE TESTING OF

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CONCRETE STRUCTURES IAEA, VIENNA, 2002
THANK YOU…
QUESTIONS??

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