Restraint effect of steel bar on early-age shrinkage of steel bar-mortar composites

Time-space-dependent stress and strain distribution within steel bar-mortar composites is key for shrinkage and cracking prediction of Reinforced-Concrete (RC) members. A novel system was designed to investigate the restraint of steel bars on the early-age shrinkage while digital image correlation was also employed to analyze spatial strain distribution. The measured restraint degree increases with the reinforcement ratio and maintains stable after about 36 h. Restraint effects is interfered by micro-cracks, because of which the calculated restraint degree matched the measured one better after being modified by a coefficient concerning reinforcement ratio. The overall restrained stress shows a three-stage process affected by the bonding evolution. The strain spatially undergoes a three-region distribution along the steel bar induced by the shear transfer and a two-region distribution on the cross-section aligning with the interface gradient. This study demonstrates a quantitative analysis on the steel bars restraint parameters and its evolution.