Experimental Study on Tensile Creep of Coarse Recycled Aggregate Concrete

Previous studies have shown that the drying shrinkage of recycled aggregate concrete (RAC) is greater than that of natural aggregate concrete (NAC). Drying shrinkage is the fundamental reason for the cracking of concrete, and tensile creep caused by the restraint of drying shrinkage plays a significant role in the cracking because it can relieve the tensile stress and results in the delay of cracking occurrence. However, up till now, all research has been focusing on the compressive creep of RAC. Therefore, in this study, a uniaxial restrained shrinkage cracking test was executed to investigate the tensile creep properties caused by the restraint of drying shrinkage of RAC. The mechanical properties, such as compressive strength, tensile splitting strength, and Young’s modulus of RAC were also investigated in this study. The results confirmed that the tensile creep of RAC caused by the restraint of shrinkage was about 20–30 % larger than that of NAC.