Brittle Creep Failure, Critical Behavior, and Time-to-Failure Prediction of Concrete under Uniaxial Compression

Understanding the time-dependent brittle deformation behavior of concrete as a main building material is fundamental for the lifetime prediction and engineering design. Herein, we present the experimental measures of brittle creep failure, critical behavior, and the dependence of time-to-failure, on the secondary creep rate of concrete under sustained uniaxial compression. A complete evolution process of creep failure is achieved. Three typical creep stages are observed, including the primary (decelerating), secondary (steady state creep regime), and tertiary creep (accelerating creep) stages. The time-to-failure shows sample-specificity although all samples exhibit a similar creep process. All specimens exhibit a critical power-law behavior with an exponent of −0.51 ± 0.06, approximately equal to the theoretical value of −1/2. All samples have a long-term secondary stage characterized by a constant strain rate that dominates the lifetime of a sample. The average creep rate expressed by the total creep strain over the lifetime (tf-t0) for each specimen shows a power-law dependence on the secondary creep rate with an exponent of −1. This could provide a clue to the prediction of the time-to-failure of concrete, based on the monitoring of the creep behavior at the steady stage.