scholarly journals Development of Low-Cost Wireless Sensing System for Smart Ultra-High Performance Concrete

Sensors ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (19) ◽  
pp. 6386
Author(s):  
Huy-Viet Le ◽  
Tae-Uk Kim ◽  
Suleman Khan ◽  
Jun-Young Park ◽  
Jong-Woong Park ◽  
...  

This study proposes the development of a wireless sensor system integrated with smart ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) for sensing and transmitting changes in stress and damage occurrence in real-time. The smart UHPC, which has the self-sensing ability, comprises steel fibers, fine steel slag aggregates (FSSAs), and multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) as functional fillers. The proposed wireless sensing system used a low-cost microcontroller unit (MCU) and two-probe resistance sensing circuit to capture change in electrical resistance of self-sensing UHPC due to external stress. For wireless transmission, the developed wireless sensing system used Bluetooth low energy (BLE) beacon for low-power and multi-channel data transmission. For experimental validation of the proposed smart UHPC, two types of specimens for tensile and compression tests were fabricated. In the laboratory test, using a universal testing machine, the change in electrical resistivity was measured and compared with a reference DC resistance meter. The proposed wireless sensing system showed decreased electrical resistance under compressive and tensile load. The fractional change in resistivity (FCR) was monitored at 39.2% under the maximum compressive stress and 12.35% per crack under the maximum compressive stress tension. The electrical resistance changes in both compression and tension showed similar behavior, measured by a DC meter and validated the developed integration of wireless sensing system and smart UHPC.

Author(s):  
Arezki Tagnit-Hamou ◽  
Nancy A. Soliman

This paper presents research work on the development of a green type of ultra-high-performance concrete using ground glass powders with different degrees of fineness (UHPGC). This article presents the development of an innovative, low-cost, and sustainable UHPGC through the use of glass powder to replace cement, and quartz powder particles. An UHPGC with a compressive strength (fc) of up to 220 MPa was prepared and its fresh, and mechanical properties were investigated. The test results indicate that the fresh UHPGC properties were improved when the cement and quartz powder were replaced with non-absorptive glass powder particles. The strength improvement can be attributed to the glass powder’s pozzolanicity and to its mechanical performance (very high strength and elastic modulus of glass). A case study of using this UHPGC is presented through the design and construction of a footbridge. Erection of footbridge at University of Sherbrooke Campus using UHPGC is also presented as a full-scale application.


2016 ◽  
Vol 74 (10) ◽  
pp. 5231-5240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Se-Dong Min ◽  
Chang-Won Wang ◽  
Hwa-Min Lee ◽  
Bong-Keun Jung

Sensors ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (20) ◽  
pp. 4364
Author(s):  
Pengju Xu ◽  
Wentao Wang

Although cable-based seismic sensing systems have provided reliable data in the past several decades, they become a bottleneck for large-area monitoring and critical environmental (volcanic eruptions) sensing because of their cost, difficulty in deploying and expanding, and lack of accurate three-dimensional geographic information. In this paper, a new wireless sensing system is designed consisting of a portable satellite device, a self-sustaining power source, a low-cost computational core, and a high-precision sensor. The emphasis of this paper is to implement in low-cost hardware without requirements of highly specialized and expensive data acquisition instruments. Meanwhile, a computational-core-embedded algorithm based on compressive sensing (CS) is also developed to compress data size for transmission and encrypt the measured data preventing information loss. Seismic data captured by the accelerometer sensor are coded into compressive data packages and then transferred via satellite communication to a cloud-based server for storage. Acceleration and GPS information is decrypted by the ℓ1-norm minimization optimization algorithm for further processing. In this research, the feasibility of the proposed sensing system for the acquisition of seismic testing is investigated in an outdoor field surface wave testing. Results indicate the proposed low-cost wireless sensing system has the capability of collecting ground motions, transferring data, and sharing GPS information via satellite communication for large area monitoring. In addition, it has a great potential of recovering measurements even with significant data package loss.


Sensors ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (7) ◽  
pp. 1573 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Bruciati ◽  
Shinae Jang ◽  
Pierre Fils

Ultra-high-performance concrete (UHPC) is a novel material with multiple known uses and many still yet to be discovered. Recently, the use of encasing welded shear studs in UHPC on the web of corroded steel beams was developed. This creates a bearing force transfer mechanism to bypass the corroded web plate. This new material and its uses come with many uncertainties in the short and long term. Structural health monitoring (SHM) can be a tool to observe the development. Specifically, radio frequency technology (RFID) can be used. RFID has existed commercially since the 1960s and has been used as a crack sensor before, but never with UHPC. RFID-based crack sensing is being used to monitor the UHPC retrofit. A crack is simulated on the UHPC specimen and then a commercial, low cost tag is secured. Using backscatter power, the tag reads the crack existence and its increasing volume with every new damage stage. Using a damage index, comparing the uncracked and each cracked stage, this method is not restricted to the raw received signal strength indicator (RSSI), which could be different at each tag. With this sensor, the small cracks that occur in UHPC during its creation can be monitored to ensure the capacity of the retrofitting is maintained. The tested RFID-based crack sensor can be used on various other forms of UHPC.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (13) ◽  
pp. 5858
Author(s):  
Aristotelis C. Tagarakis ◽  
Dimitrios Kateris ◽  
Remigio Berruto ◽  
Dionysis Bochtis

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) can be reliable tools in agricultural management. In this work, a low cost, low power consumption, and simple wireless sensing system dedicated for agricultural environments is presented. The system is applicable to small to medium sized fields, located anywhere with cellular network coverage, even in isolated rural areas. The novelty of the developed system lies in the fact that it uses a dummy device as Coordinator which through simple but advanced programming can receive, process, and send data packets from all End-nodes to the cloud via a 4G cellular network. Furthermore, it is energy independent, using solar energy harvesting panels, making it feasible to operate in remote, isolated fields. A star topology was followed for the sake of simplification, low energy demands and increased network reliability. The developed system was tested and evaluated in laboratory and real field environment with satisfactory operation in terms of independence, and operational reliability concerning packet losses, communication range (>250 m covering fields up to 36 ha), energy autonomy, and uninterrupted operation. The network can support up to seven nodes in a 30 min data acquisition cycle. These results confirmed the potential of this system to serve as a viable option for monitoring environmental, soil, and crop parameters.


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