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Over the past few years, the mechanisms of ionic transport in cement systems have received a great deal of attention. Chloride-related damage to an increasing number of concrete structures have led to intense research efforts dedicated to chloride ingress in porous materials. Most published reports on the subject have strongly emphasized the intricate nature of the problem. Given the number of parameters involved, analytical models have proved inadequate to describe the ionic transport process. Numerical modeling is therefore required. The first generation of models considered only the chloride ion. The latest models consider other species besides the chloride that are present in the pore solution, allowing better representation of the physical and chemical mechanisms. STADIUM® belongs to this latest generation.
The objective of this document is to provide users of STADIUM® with all the information needed to perform numerical simulations. The first section briefly describes the mathematical, chemical, and numerical models that are programmed into the software.
The next section provides step-by-step instructions on creating and running a simulation, including actual screenshots of the interface. Examples are also provided to facilitate parameter selection.
Following the user’s guide, the two input files that accompany the software are described. One input file represents an immersion test and the second simulates a parking structure exposed to chloride for fifty years.
After running a simulation, STADIUM® creates four different output files. One file contains data on convergence rate of numerical algorithms (transport and chemistry) at each step at the time. The other three files contain the calculation results. The next section describes these output files.
Experimental procedures for the migration and drying tests are given in the next section of the document. These tests evaluate the diffusion and water transport properties of cementitious materials. The procedure for estimating the composition of the pore solution is also detailed.
The last section lists the papers that have been published on STADIUM®. Some of them describe the theory and numerical algorithms at the core of the model, while others are dedicated to studies on actual structures.
Web site: http://www.simcotechnologies.com/
