Characterization of damage in concrete beams under bending with Acoustic Emission Technique (AET)

This paper aims to improve knowledge on the degradation mechanisms of concrete beams subjected to flexural loading by using the Acoustic Emission Technique (AET). A strong correlation between damage evolution and acoustic emission activities was highlighted. Damage severity was also assessed by means of the Calm and Load ratio classification and the results obtained were in good agreement with those of mechanical testing. Empirical laws describing the relationship between damage evolution and acoustic emission activities were proposed in order to predict the degradation state of the material from AE activities and it seems that these laws depend only on the type of material tested. Finally, an analysis of the waveforms associated with one event (namely the same source) was carried out. The results show the difficulty of identifying a specific source from the AE signature.