UNIVERSITY OF DAR ES SALAAM

DEPARTMENT OF STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING

SD211: CIVIL ENGINEERING MATERIALS I

INTRODUCTION TO
THE STRUCTURE
AND BEHAVIOUR
OF BUILDING MATERIALS
LECTURE No. 8

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1.8 Durability
 Durability describes the time-dependent
change in mechanical properties of a
material, as well as other physical or
chemical changes, which may result in a loss
of useful service of a structure.
 Apart from long-term stresses, durability of a
material is also influenced by:
 Weather
 Chemical attack
 Biological attack
 Incompatibility of component compounds
 Abrasion
 Fire
 Light, etc. 2
Examples of loss of durability due to
weather:
 Temperature changes may cause thermal
expansion of layers of different materials;
the resulting constraining stresses may lead
to cracks
 Freezing of water in pores may lead to the
chipping away of stones, bricks and concrete
 Rain may increase moisture content of
timber, thus facilitating biological attack by
fungi
 Rain may also facilitate corrosion of metals
 Light with intensive UV rays may cause
discolouration of material surfaces. 3
 Example of chemical attack:

 Carbonation of concrete: the

CO2 in the atmosphere reacts
slowly with Ca(OH)2 present in
concrete to form CaCO3; the pH
value of concrete is lowered
thereby facilitating corrosion of
reinforcement steel bars.
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Examples of Biological attack:
 Biological attack is particularly
dangerous in timber: fungi is the
main problem, although insects
such as termites can also be very
dangerous
 Plastics may also attacked by
insects.
 Non-metallic, inorganic materials
may be attacked by certain
bacterial and algae.
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Examples of incompatibility of
materials:
 Durability of materials can be
lowered through the combination of
components which cannot co-exist;
 Mixing different types of cement
may lead to durability problems;
 Metals with different
electrochemical potentials may, if
in contact, result in faster corrosion
of one of the metals.
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Abrasion:
 Abrasion is a type of
mechanical attack which is
dependent on the friction
coefficients of the materials
involved.
 Abrasion causes the wearing
away of the material surface.
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 Fire:
 Fire damage is dependent upon the
flame temperatures;
 Fire damage may result in major
changes in the original properties of a
material;
 The resistance of a building material to
fire depends on:
 Flammability of the material
 Thermal conductivity of the material
 Density of the material
 Thickness of the structural
member/material 8
Radiation:
 High-energy radioactive radiation
may cause dislocations in the
atomic lattice of metals;
 Radiation may also increase the
polymerization of plastics, and
hence the brittleness;
 It may also decrease the strength
and modulus of elasticity of
concrete.
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Durability may be
improved by means of:
 Impregnation of materials
with preservatives;
 Waterproofing covers or
paints;
 Skillful choice of materials;
 Good architectural and
structural design.
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 1.9 Safety
 The professional engineer has to
guarantee the safety of the structure
he/she designs against damage and/or
failure.
 The structure may fail if:
 The elastic deformations are too large;
 The vibrations are too large;
 The cracks are too wide;
 Durability is poor;
 Collapse occurs (insufficient strength);
 Etc. 11
The types of damage which
may occur are:
 Light damage: repairable at
reasonable or little cost;
 Severe damage with warning:
repairable, even if at high cost;
 Severe damage without warning
(brittle failure): may lead to loss
of life.
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CODE of Hammurabi (Babylon, 2040BC)
“If a builder has made a house for a
man and has not made his work
sound, and that house falls down
and causes the death of the
householder, that builder shall be
put to death; If it causes the death
of that householder’s son, they
should put that builder’s son to
death…………If it destroys
property he shall replace anything
that has been destroyed; and
………… he shall rebuild the house
from his own property”
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“Ifa builder has made a
house for a man and does
not make his house
perfect and the wall
bulges, that builder shall
put that wall into sound
condition from his own
silver”
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 Modern standards and codes of
practice recognize that absolute
safety is impossible to attain;
 The reliability of a structure is
expressed as the inverse of the
probability of its failing;
 A failure probability of 0.001
means that one failure may be
expected out of 1000 identical
objects.
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 Statistical evaluations reveal that
structural failures may be caused
by:
 Overloading: 50% of all structural
failures;
 Inadequate strength: 50% of all
failures.
 The reasons behind these failures
lie in:
 Design errors: 60% of all structural
failures;
 Poor construction work: 40% of all
failures. 16
Uncertainties involved in load
assumptions include:
 Serious mistakes in load
magnitudes
 Over-simplification of the structural
system
 Calculation errors
 Negligence of constraining stresses
due to resisted deformations;
 Unconsidered disasters like fire,
impact, explosions, etc.
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 Uncertainties in the assumed
strength of a material:

 Deviations of the material

properties from the mean
values;
 Invisible defects;
 Inaccurate consideration of
effects such as fatigue, member
size and shape, etc.
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Both load and material strength
assumptions are further subjected
to the following uncertainties:
 Departure of the material and
structural behaviour from the
usually assumed laws of Hooke,
Navier, etc.;
 Poor construction work;
 Inadequate supervision and
checking of design, construction
or material quality
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 Uncertainties can be overcome
through research; or
 Through the use of the SAFETY
FACTOR, .
 (strength at failure)/ =
Design or working strength.
 The safety factor for inorganic
materials lies between 1.7 and
3.0; for timber it is up to 10.
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Safety consideration

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