Development, Calibration, And Validation Of Lateral Displacement For A Concrete Uniaxial Compression Test

This research presents a novel uniaxial compression test system for concrete specimens. The motivation for this development comes from the need to calibrate and validate multi-scale numerical methods for the analysis of concrete structures, a research field which requires new experimental systems for concrete. The aim of this study is to offer an experimental methodology and to develop an experimental uniaxial compression system which provides the results needed for the calibration and validation of multi-scale models. The uniqueness of the suggested experimental system is related to its ability to measure the lateral displacements of a specimen with a rectangular cross section. The main challenges to achieving reliable results using electro-mechanical means are concerned with attachment of the lateral gauges so that it can follow the targeted spot with progressing longitudinal deformation. The unique experimental system developed for this study was found to be accurate and was validated by comparing macroscopic experimental results such as: displacements, modulus of elasticity and Poisson's ratio with the literature on concrete and aluminum specimens.