Abstract

In recent years, the construction industry worldwide has increased, boosted by the economic development of the countries, where concrete is undoubtedly, the most used material, so it becomes relevant, to study the characteristics and the behavior of this material in different conditions. Within the mechanical properties, toughness stands out, which can be understood as the capacity of a material to absorb energy before fracturing. At present, there are different specialized tests to determine this value of toughness. These tests can be both destructive and non-destructive, as well as direct and indirect. The present research work develops an alternative methodology to the classical procedures for the estimation of the toughness, through the use of computational tools that use the finite element method to predict, in a virtual way, the behavior of a specimen of concrete fc'30. The results were validated with experimental data. In conclusion, it was found that the proposed methodology yields values for fracture toughness that coincide with the literature reported.