Fracture behavior and mechanical properties of engineered cementitious composites exposed to long-term sulfate and chloride environments

The fracture properties of engineered cementitious composites (ECC) exposed to dry-wet cycles in sulfate and sulfate-chloride solutions were studied by three-point bending (TPB) beams at the corrosion periods of 0, 30, 90, 130, 180, 270, and 360 days. The digital image correlation (DIC) technique was used to understand the whole fracture process. The fracture toughness and fracture energy were calculated using the proposed method, and the evolution of the horizontal strain field, displacement field, and fracture process zone (FPZ) were investigated. Meanwhile, the compressive and tensile performance of the specimens at the same corrosion periods were analyzed. The results showed that (1) Compared to water immersion, the environments of sulfate and sulfate-chloride were beneficial in improving the compressive and tensile strength, and weakening the tensile ductility. (2) With increasing the corrosion time, the evolution of the unstable fracture toughness can be distinguished into three phases: a stable phase, an increasing phase, and a rapidly decreasing phase, and the initial fracture toughness followed an increasing and then decreasing trend. The fracture energy initially decreased and tended to stabilize after 130 days. (3) By using DIC technology, as the corrosion time increased, the horizontal opening displacement at the notch tip showed a decreasing trend and stabilized after 90 days generally. The fracture path determined through horizontal displacement was well matched with the macrocrack trajectory. (4) The addition of chloride ions helped to improve the mechanical properties of ECC under long-term corrosion, such as compressive strength, unstable fracture toughness, fracture energy, and opening displacement at the notch tip. Compare to concrete, ECC exhibited greater resistance to sulfate corrosion.