Autogenous healing of engineered cementitious composites at early age

Autogenous healing of early ages (3 days) ECC damaged by tensile preloading was investigated after exposure to different conditioning regimes: water/air cycles, water/high temperature air cycles, 90%RH/air cycles, and submersion in water. Resonant frequency measurements and uniaxial tensile tests were used to assess the rate and extent of self-healing. The test results show that ECC, tailored for high tensile ductility up to several percent and with self-controlled crack width below 60 μm, experiences autogenous healing under environmental exposures in the presence of water. However, the recovery for these early age specimens is not as efficient as the recovery for more mature specimen, for the same amount of pre-damage and exposure to the same environment. Even so, the self-healing for these early age specimens demonstrates high robustness when the preloading strain is limited to 0.3%. This conclusion is supported by the evidence of resonant frequency and stiffness recovery of the healed ECC materials.