NDE of the Integrity of a Clincer 40,000 ton Concrete Structure

The aim of this article is to approve a procedure for the integrity evaluation of a concrete structure based on the low frequency ultrasonic tomography that is the new method in concrete evaluation technology. The procedure was built and performed in the NDE integrity of the CLINCER 40,000 ton concrete located in north Albania. The procedure of the NDE integrity is write as a combination of the visual inspection performed for more than 30%, of the outside surface, rebound hammer technic and the low frequency ultrasonic tomography techniques. The visual inspection locates sign of corrosion, deterioration, mechanical damage on the surface determining the typology and size. Rebound hammer technic of the compressive strength of the concrete give data to determine the quality of concrete according European standards. In the areas where the discontinuities are indicated and the evaluation of the concrete quality is performed, the volume of the wall was scanned with low frequency ultrasonic tomography system, that provides good penetration depth, good sensitivity and imaging resolution by implementing three dimensional image. The equipment used is low frequency ultrasonic tomography ACS A1020 MIRA Lite. After all the inspection results of the procedure proposed was satisfactory, regarding reinforcement bars localization, detection of voids, estimation of their position, and thickness measurements from one side. Those elements are the foundations of the NDE integrity of the concrete structure.