J Build Rehabil (2016) 1:1
DOI 10.1007/s41024-016-0001-x
RESEARCH ARTICLE
A novel methodology for obtainment of compressive strength
of concrete
Thiago Silva1 • Hizadora D’Ambros1 • Esequiel Mesquita2
Fernanda Santos1 • André Mendes1 • Flávio Lelis1
Received: 15 December 2015 / Accepted: 11 July 2016 / Published online: 6 August 2016
Ó Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016
Abstract The present work provides a special contribution
for assessment of the compressive strength of the concrete
through a low-cost test. Here, an alternative pull out test is
presented and an experimental campaign was carried out
aiming the demonstrate the applicability of this novel
methodology. Three different classes of concrete were
performed, namely C20 (20 MPa), C25 (25 MPa) and C40
(40 MPa), each one with two variations of the reinforce-
ment rebar diameter, that were 10 and 16 mm. In addition,
references samples also were casted and submitted to
compressive strength test by NBR 5739. The results found
confirmed the applicability of the novel methodology for
obtainment compressive strength of concrete.
Keywords Low cost pull out test  Compressive strength
of concrete  Concrete quality control  Field testing
1 Introduction
The essential characteristic for reinforced concrete exis-
tence is the perfect adhesion between the concrete (C) and
the reinforcement rebars (RR). However, the mechanism of
adhesion between these two different materials results from
association between the chemical, mechanical and friction
& Thiago Silva
thiago@ifto.edu.br
1 mechanical properties of the concrete and the cement.
Departamento de Engenharia Civil, Instituto Federal de
Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia de Tocantins, AE 310 Sul,
Avenida LO 05, s/n, Palmas, Tocantins 77.021-090, Brazil
2
CONSTRUCT-LESE, Faculty of Engineering, University of
Porto, Dr Roberto Frias street, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal
• Alcimar Milhomem1 •
adhesion [1]. According to Daoud et al. [2] the bond
existent at reinforcement bars and the surrounding concrete
is indicate as the fundamental factor for reinforced concrete
performance, and comprises an important aspect that
should be taken into account during the structural assess-
ment. Nonetheless, the bond between the rebars and the
concrete can be affected by a large number of factor, as the
water/cement relation, aggregates characteristics and cure
conditions.
A recent study on crack emergence in the zone of
adhesion steel–concrete was presented by Ožbolt et al. [3]
considering the effect of the different levels of corrosion
using the 3D chemo-hygro-thermo-mechanical model.
Basically this model considered the physical, electro-
chemical process with the concrete mechanical perfor-
mance and also considered radial concrete resistance as
linear elastic, and the adhesion zone as an isotopic area. In
this analysis, finite element method was employed, and the
numerical model was calibrated based on simplified
experimental test. The results showed that chemo-hygro-
thermo-mechanical properties presents a large influence in
the crack emergence and consequently for bond resistance
between the RR-C [2].
Studies related with the porosity influence on cement
matrix and its relationship with the adhesion mechanisms
between the cement paste, aggregates and reinforced rebars
(in case of reinforced concrete) has been carried out from
reinforced concrete advance. However, only in the 70
decade, the studies on RR-C bond characteristics were
oriented aiming the obtainment of relations between the
Now, the bond RR-C has been performed in terms of
numerical modeling and the zone characteristics imple-
mented aiming a most real model about the behavior of
rebar-concrete surrounding zone [4–6].
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According to NBR 6118 [7] the capacity of resistance,
performance in service and durability are some of the
minimum quality requirements that concrete structures
must to attend. Additionally, if this parameter was mea-
sured in the early ages dramatic situations can be analyzed
and decision could be adopted for safety maintenance in a
short time.
One of the most important parameters considered during
safety assessment is the compressive strength of the con-
crete. However, for compressive strength assessment a
destructive method based on axial rupture of cubic or
cylindrical samples is commonly employed (see [14, 15]).
In fact, for this destructive method the concrete specimens
should be casted with concrete and after a period deter-
mined the compressive strength should be determinate in
laboratories through specific pressure machine. But some-
times the laboratories are not of easy accessed to owners
and this can make difficult the quality control, and espe-
cially in emerging economies this fact contributes to
owners treat this important step as a subjective factor for
the building safety. This way, advances on the methods for
quality control of buildings material are essentials for
maintenance of the quality control and safety of the
buildings, especially during it application in field.
According to Silva et al. [8] the use of compressive
strength test is motivated by: (1) low complexity of test
procedures; (2) easy interpretation of results; (3) satisfac-
tory correlation of this parameter with others resistances,
tensile strength, shear strength, bond strength armor-con-
crete. Nonetheless, some limitations in this experimental
test may be identified, as: (1) the test is characterized by a
displacement test imposed at support sides which does not
create a uniform stress field imposed on the sides for a
heterogeneous material such as concrete; (2) the influence
of technique and materials used in the regularization or
leveling the top at test results; and (3) not consideration of
the bond RR-C.
In truth, the bond RR-C characterization is a relevant
parameter for structural safety assessment, and should not
be excluded from technological control. This way, the
employment of pull out test should be considerate in order
to improve more information about the reinforced concrete
behavior [4] and, in addition can be used for provide
forecast on compressive strength of concrete.
The pull out method is standardized by RILEM/CEB/
FIP RC6 [9]. This proceeding consists in pull out one steel
bar centered in a specimen placed on support plates of a
testing machine. The traction force applied to one end of
bar and enough to slip inside the concrete block the other
end is measured. The test results can be expressed as the
variation of slip measured at the free end of the bar versus
pull out strength.
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J Build Rehabil (2016) 1:1
Recently, low cost assessment methods has been
developed on the field of the liquid measurement and
thermal monitoring [10–12]. Nevertheless, exist a gab on
the techno-scientific field regarding to a low cost pull out
test for concrete samples, with easy applicability and high
results accuracy.
Based in the above mentioned reasons, the present
works intents to provide a novel pull out methodology
focused to obtainment of the compressive strength of
concrete. In the following section the experimental cam-
paign and the proposed methodology will be described, as
well the results and the conclusion.
2 Experimental
2.1 Novel pull out methodology
For the proposed methodology application, a pull out test
machine was built, as showed Figs. 1 and 2. The pull out
machine consist in a metallic structure with a rectangular
base (100 cm 9 20 cm) linked with a hydraulic jack with
maximum load capacity of 10 tones, analogical pressure
gauge and manual loading. For the pull out test the con-
crete samples should be initially centralized and the loads
applied (manual override of hydraulic jack) considering the
intervals of 10 s aiming most accuracy of the data
measurements.
The work mechanism of the proposed pull out machine
consists that the force applied at the bar should be mea-
sured although a manometer accomplished to pull out
machine till failure of the adhesion RR-C.
Sequentially, the measured values obtained by pull out
test should be converted to adhesive strength through
Eq. 1, where fbd = adhesive strength of calculation;
Rs = force applied along the rebar length; ; = steel bar
diameter; lb = anchorage length. Then, the characteristic
tensile resistance can be obtained by Eq. 2, where g1 ¼ 1:0
(without rib bar); g1 ¼ 1:4 (carve bar); g1 ¼ 2:25 (rib bar);
g2 ¼ 1:0 (good adherence); g2 ¼ 0:7 (poor adherence);
Fig. 1 Overview of machine of pull out test modified
J Build Rehabil (2016) 1:1
Fig. 2 Overview of machine of pull out test modified model
g3 ¼ 1:0 (diameter bar lower than 3.2 mm); g3 ¼
ð132  ;Þ=100 (diameter bar greater than 3.2 mm), and
finally the compressive strength of the concrete can be
estimated by Eq. 3, where: fctd = characteristic tensile
resistance; fck = compressive strength of concrete, and
cc = specific mass of concrete [7].
fbd ¼ Rs =ðp:;:lb Þ
fbd ¼ g1 :g2 :g3 :fctd
 
2=3
fctd ¼ 0:21  fck =cc
2.2 Materials and concrete samples preparation
For the concrete mixtures, the following materials were
used: a pozzolan cement, namely Portland cement (CPII-Z)
with specific mass of 3.02 g/cm3 and specific surface area
(Blaine) of 3200 cm2/g was employed. A fine sand was
also used part of the aggregates, characterized by 1.510 kg/
dm3 of unitary mass, specific mass of 2.67 g/cm3, fineness
modulus of 2.40 and maximum nominal size of 2.40 mm.
The coarse aggregate presented 1.651 kg/dm3 of unitary
mass, specific mass of 2.63 g/cm3, fineness modulus of
0.85 and maximum nominal size of 19.00 mm.
For the concrete mixtures design the American Concrete
Institute’s method (ACI) [13] was employed. Three dif-
ferent concrete mixtures were designed for each compres-
sive strength class, C20 (20 MPa), C25 (25 MPa) and C40
(40 MPa) and then, 18 concrete samples were casted, 9
with reinforced rebars diameter of 10 mm (here titled as
E10) and 9 with diameter of 16 mm (assigned as E16).
Additionally, nine reference concrete samples (titled as E0)
were casted according to [14]. In the total, 27 concrete
samples were tested after 28 days submitted to cure by
immersion.
The concrete mixtures presented a mortar index around
54 %, maximum slump of 75 mm and minimum slump of
25 mm, index of incorporated air around 2 %. The water/
cement index changed between 0.54 (C20) to 0.40 (C40).
Page 3 of 5 1
The concrete samples dedicated to the pull out test (E10
and E16) were casted by a 1.5 L plastic bottle, where
reinforced rebars with 40 cm of length were passed by the
top hole till crossing the plastic bottle symmetrically.
Following, the plastic bottle was fill by concrete and after
24 h submitted to cure by immersion during 28 days. For
the pull out test, the plastic bottle was not removed because
does not present influence to test measures.
The E0 concrete samples were casted in metallic
cylindrical shapes, with diameter of 10 cm and height of
20 cm. The recommendations described in [14] were
adopted. After 24 h the metallic cylindrical shapes were
removed and the E0 concrete samples were also submitted
to cure by immersion till the experimental campaign.
2.3 Methodology
Initially, the E0 samples were submitted to compressive
strength test according with NBR 5739 [15]. For this, a
hydraulic pressure machine with load limit capacity of 1000
ð1Þ kN was used. Now, for E10 and E16 tests was necessary to
ð2Þ fill with cotton the bottle cap to create a non-adherence zone
in order to prevent the reaction of the backing plate that
ð3Þ compresses the concrete, restricts the transverse deformation
and causes the overestimation of the bond stress in concrete,
mainly because the concrete remains confined in its plastic
mold during the test. The samples E10 and E16 were care-
fully centralized in the pull out machine in order to avoid
measure distortions. Following, the loading was manually
applied till the maximum pull out stress be achieved and the
tension measured in the manometer was noted. All the
details of these procedures are shown in the Fig. 3.
It is necessary to state that the proposal methodology is
limited to reinforced rebars diameters equal or less than
16 mm, due to top hole of the plastic bottle support
diameters till 16 mm.
3 Results
The compressive strength values obtained for the E0-C20
concrete samples testing were of 17.39, 21.03 and
22.41 MPa. Now, the compressive strength values were of
23.45, 26.01 and 26.72 MPa for E0-C25 and of 42.35, 45.68
and 47.32 MPa for E0-C40. The compressive strength
average values for the E0 samples were of 20.27 MPa
(C20), 25.39 MPa (C25) and 45.11 MPa (C40). The E0
results were plotted and used for comparison with the E10
and E16 samples results, as showed by Figs. 4 and 5. In
general, the E0 samples presented compressive resistance
values really near to the compressive strength design, also
presented a low dispersion between each samples, consid-
ering the concrete classes C20, C25 and C40.
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Fig. 3 Pull out testing with the

concrete samples E10 and E16,
and the details of the plastic
bottle used as molds

50 Table 1 Experimental results of the E10 and E16

C20 C25 C40
Samples Rs (Ton) fbd (MPa) fctd (MPa) fck (MPa)
Compressive strength (MPa)

40
E10
C20 1.3 5.24 1.63 21.63
30 C20 1.2 4.84 1.51 19.19
E10
E0 C20 1.25 5.04 1.57 20.40
20 C25 1.5 5.76 1.79 24.90
C25 1.4 5.37 1.67 22.45
C25 1.6 6.14 1.91 27.43
10
C40 2 7.96 2.48 40.51
C40 2.1 8.36 2.60 43.59
0 C40 2.15 8.56 2.66 45.15
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
E16
Samples
C20 2.1 5.29 1.65 21.95
Fig. 4 Compressive strength results of the E0 and E10 C20 2.2 5.54 1.72 23.53
C20 2 5.04 1.57 20.40
C25 2.2 5.47 1.70 23.09
50
C20 C25 C40 C25 2.1 5.22 1.63 21.54
C25 2.25 5.60 1.74 23.88
Compressive strength (MPa)

40 C40 3.3 7.91 2.46 40.14

C40 3.5 8.39 2.61 43.85
30 C40 3.5 8.39 2.61 43.85
E16
E0
20 expressions 1, 2 and 3, as previously mentioned. All the
experimental results range are showed in the Table 1.
10 The compressive strength results of E0 and E10 samples
are compared in the Fig. 4, where is possible to observe
that the results present similar values really closed each
0
other. Taking into account the C20 class, the standard
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Samples
variation of the compressive strength between E0 and E10
was of 1.80 MPa, and to classes C25 and C40 the standard
Fig. 5 Compressive strength results of the E0 and E16 variation values remained low, 1.52 and 2.50 MPa
respectively. However, for 77.7 % of the concrete samples
Concerning to pull out tests results, taking into account the compressive strength values of the E0 were superiors to
the Rs values collected during the experimental campaign E10 values, this same characteristic is also observed in the
the fbd , fctd and fck values were obtained through E16 results.

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Concerning to E16 results, a comparison between them
and the E0 compressive strength values also confirmed low
standard variation values, namely 1.81 MPa for C20,
1.52 MPa for C25 and 2.50 MPa for C40.
4 Conclusions
In this work a novel methodology for obtainment of the
compressive strength of concrete based on pull out test was
presented, namely a low cost method. The results found
showed that the compressive strength can be easily deter-
minate by employment of the RILEM expressions and that
the compressive strength values measured during the
experimental campaign presents a linear relation with the
values from the regular compressive strength test, stan-
dardized by NBR 5738 [15].
In fact, this method can be employed as an alternative
test for determination of the compressive strength of con-
crete in field applications, and can be used as a support tool
for concrete quality control.
Acknowledgments Hizadora D’Ambros acknowledge the Junior
Scientific Initiation fellowship of Federal Institute of Education,
Science and Technology of Tocantins (IFTO). Esequiel Mesquita
acknowledge CAPES through the Fellowship Number 10023/13-5,
Fundação CAPES, Ministério da Educação do Brasil. The authors
acknowledges the Civil Engineering Laboratory of IFTO.
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