Fatigue damage for reinforced concrete offshore structures.

When concrete structures are subjected to fatigue loading, resulting from ice or wave loads, progressive damage occurs with increasing number of cycles. A nonlinear damage evolution equation is suggested to predict fatigue life of plain concrete subjected to sequential, constant amplitude loading. This approach seems to eliminate the nonconservative aspect of the linear damage law (the Miner hypothesis) and is based on the observed shape of the damage growth relationship. A simple nonlinear relationship is developed to relate the increases in deflection and crack width with the cycle ratio. The results compare favourably with experimental data. (A)