Steel Reinforced Concrete Structures

Abstract

The civilization of any country is measured by the advanced techniques used in constructing its buildings. Concrete is the main element used in construction materials and its development in any country means that there have been developments in that country’s engineering thinking. Ancient Egypt used concrete in its buildings and temples; Egyptians used crushed stone as an aggregate and clay as an adhesive. The Greeks used concrete in their buildings and called it Santorin Tofa (El-Arian and Atta 1974); the Romans used a material called pozzolana that was like concrete. After that, the formula for concrete was lost for many centuries. In the eighteenth century, a number of famous scientists worked to create a formula for concrete: • John Smeaton used concrete to construct the Eddystone Lighthouse. • Joseph Parker conducted research on stone and its uses in concrete. • Edgar researched using cement made from limestone and clay. • Louis Vicat also tried to develop cement from limestone and clay. • Joseph Aspdin finally finished his research by developing portland cement. At the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, the architectural shapes of buildings underwent major changes as architectural engineers and builders changed their points of view. Previously, they had used the same ideas found in the European Renaissance, using columns and arches to move toward the functional use of buildings. For functional use and to achieve the architectural dream with an economic approach, concrete was the best solution. Nowadays, reinforced concrete is considered the most famous and important material in the construction industry. It is used for buildings and for different types of civil engineering projects, such as tunnels, bridges, airports, and drainage and hydraulic projects. Research is focused on increasing the performance of concrete to match these varieties of applications. Reinforced concrete is considered inexpensive compared to other building materials; thus, it has been used for high-rise building for megaprojects and also for smaller projects such as one-story buildings; all these projects are handled by contractors and engineers with different capabilities. Therefore, sometimes the reinforced concrete does not perform correctly according to specifications; in some cases, there is a difference between the quality required by the standard or code and that found on the site. These situations are usually due to a lack of worker, foreman, or engineer competence. Other construction errors are due to a lack of quality-control procedures, materials received at the site that are incompatible with the standard, improper selection of materials, or a concrete mix that does not fit the surrounding environmental conditions. The main challenge that faces the engineer working in the con