NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS REPORT

NIBS PROJECT NBS REPORT

42 1.04- lie -42 1*270 *3 May 1966 9308

GALVANIC CORROSION OF METALS IN CEMENTING MATERIALS

by

Joseph W. Pitts

NOT FOR PUB-LICA i'IO.\

Presented at the

Annual Meeting

of the

Society of American Military Engineers

NATIONAL BUREAU OF

for use within the Governmei

and review. For this reason; whole or in part, is not au Bureau of Standards, Wasbi

the Report has been specific

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on October 9, 2015.

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il copies for its own use.

U. S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS
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GALVANIC CORROSION OF METALS IN CEMENTING MATERIALS

by

Joseph W. Pitts

INTRODUCTION

The two cementing materials that are of concern in this paper are concrete and gypsum plaster. Galvanic corrosion of embedded metals is known

to have caused failures in steel-reinforced concrete containing aluminum conduit and in gypsum plaster on metal lath. Inasmuch as concrete failures are

much more numerous, the greater part of this discussion will involve concrete

systems, although the basic cause of failure is the same in both systems.

ALUMINUM CONDUIT IN CONCRETE

The first publicized case of concrete failure attributed to corrosion

of embedded aluminum conduit occurred in a hospital in Smith Falls, Ontario,

Canada in the early 1950's. A comprehensive investigation of this failure

was reported in 1955 by Wright‘S, who concluded that the failure resulted

from galvanic corrosion of the aluminum in the steel-reinforced concrete

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. that contained calcium chloride (CaC^).. Several other investigations of

the behavior of aluminum in concrete have been reported since then; a concise

review of this literature is given by Monfore and Ost—/

.

A notable example of concrete failure of this type occurred in the Washington, D. C. area in the new District of Columbia Stadium. This stadium was

completed late in 1961 and cracks began to appear a few months later. Figure 1

shows cracks that had developed in a ceiling and that had caused some concrete

to spall off. Repair of defects such as these involved chipping away the sur-
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rounding concrete, removing the corroded aluminum conduit, replacing it with

steel conduit , and finally recasting fresh concrete « To date some 15,000 ft.

of aluminum conduit have been replaced in the D. G. Stadium^/.

Figure 1. Cracks in a concrete ceiling of the

District of Columbia Stadium. The cracks follow

the path of the embedded aluminum conduit to

the electrical fixture in upper left corner.

The D. C. Stadium example is fairly typical of concrete failures due to

corrosion of aluminum conduit; i.e., cracks appear in the concrete and follow

the path of the buried aluminum conduit. The cracks may be accompanied by

chipping and spalling of the concrete. In some extreme cases the concrete
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cracking has resulted in structural weakening of sections of buildings. In i o not all cases, however, does the concrete fail. The first symptcr of trouble

at Smith Falls was the inability of electricians to pull wires through the

conduit. Examination of the conduit revealed that corrosion of the aluminum

had collapsed the conduit walls due to pressure from the corrosion products.

Apparently, the concrete was strong enough to resist cracking and hence the

only indication of corrosion was the plugged conduit.

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STEEL TIE WIRES IN PLASTER

The corrosion of steel tie wires and the subsequent failure of a plastered

surface is another example of damage to a cementing material due to galvanic

corrosion of embedded metals. Failures of this type, however, are relatively

.Isirisdaat *» al -hshbadas* rare. One such case occurred in 1963 when a suspended, plastered ceiling in

a military hospital fell only a few months after installation. It was subsequently determined that the cause of failure was galvanic corrosion of the

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» I o - *‘rs»r ^ ~ ? ~ steel tie wires in the system. Tie wires are light-gage wires used to tie the

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• : ... . metal lath to the upper supporting members. This particular ceiling also

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contained a grid network of copper tubing for hot water radiant heating. Subsecue t analysis of the plaster revealed that it unaccountably contained

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4400 ppm of chloride ions.

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I’ MECHANISMS OF FAILURE

In both of the above systems the mechanism of corrosion is the same. sdT . ssbostroa osb shcnz* &r!3 bbstsoosd , , s ,

. ., Both contain the essential components of a galvanic cell--two dissimilar

metals immersed in an electrolyte5^. This is illustrated in Figure 2.

* An electrolyte is any electrically conducting medium containing free ions.
ALUM/WUM

Figure 2. Schematic diagram showing two dissimilar

metals embedded in a cementing material.

Consider first that Figure 2 is a simplified schematic diagram of the concrete

steel reinforcement- aluminum conduit system. During the time that the concrete

is damp it is a fairly good electrolyte. The steel and aluminum serve as electrodes and, because of their different positions in the electrochemical series of

elements, there is an electrical potential (voltage) developed between them. If

an external connection is made between the steel and aluminum (as shown by the

dashed lines in Figure 2) a current will flow in the circuit just as in any other

galvanic cell battery. The aluminum, being more active (less noble in the

electrochemical series),, than steel (iron), becomes the anode and corrodes. The
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steel becomes the cathode and tends to be protected. The intensity and

duration of the current flow will depend on a number of variables, some of

which will be discussed later. The mechanism of failure of the concrete is

that the aluminum corrosion products occupy a larger volume than the aluminum

plus its reactants. Thus, the increased volume requirement results in an

internal pressure build-up around the conduit. If the conduit is thin-walled

and deeply buried in strong concrete the pressure may collapse the conduit,

as happened in the Smith Falls case. Otherwise, the concrete will crack.

Consider now that Figure 2 is a schematic diagram of the gypsum plastersteel tie wire-copper tybing system. (It would appear that the system should

include the metal lath, but because the lath had been pre-painted, it was

electrically insulated from the system.) Let the electrode marked "aluminum"

represent the copper tubing. Since copper is more noble than iron in the

electrochemical series, it becomes the cathode and is protected, while the

steel becomes the anode and corrodes. When the steel tie wires in a plastered

ceiling corrode through or become sufficiently weakened, the plaster and metal

lath will fall under their own weight.

In actual building construction the dissimilar metals in the two systems

discussed will, for practical reasons, nearly always be in electrical contact.

The contact may be external to the cementing material, as shown in Figure 2,

but usually the contact will be both external and internal. The galvanic cell

principle applies in both cases. The only difference is that when contact is

internal, corrosion will tend to be greater near the junction.
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VARIABLES

It is obvious that everyfcime a builder buries aluminum conduit in

reinforced concrete or puts any two dissimilar metals in a cementing material

he is, unwittingly or not, building a giant battery. How effective the

battery will be in corroding the anode depends on a number of variables.

First, the cementing material obviously must be electrically conductive to

be an electrolyte. Freshly mixed commercial concretes and plasters always

contain enough dissolved ionized compounds to make them fairly good conductors.

But their conductivities decrease as the cements dry out because both the

number of free ions and the ionic mobilities decrease. The rate of drying

varies depending on the season of the year and other conditions. Thus, the

drying period may extend indefinitely; in fact, the gel- like structure of

cement never completely dries out.

Another factor that has a tremendous effect on the conductivity of

concrete is the amount of accelerator that is added to the concrete. It is

common practice during cold weather construction to add calcium chloride

(up to 2% by weight of cement) to concrete to hasten the set. CaC^ tends to

increase corrosion in two ways: (1) It enhances the activity of the galvanic

cell by increasing its conductivity. Studies in our laboratory^/ in connection with the gypsum plaster failure showed that the conductivity of a

commercial gypsum plaster was increased by about five times when 1% CaC^ was

added. A comparable increase in the conductivity of port land cement concrete

might be expected. (2) The second function of CaCl^ is chemical in nature.

Normally in concrete without chloride, the aluminum initially reacts with the
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cement, but the reaction products form a protective film which inhibits further

corrosion^ . When the concrete contains CaC^ , however, the chloride ion

diffuses to the anode where it tends to break down the protective film on the

aluminum and form a non-protect ive hydrated aluminum chloride compound

Another signifies.; variable affecting the rate of corrosion is the

proximity of the two dissimilar metals in the concrete. If the two metals

are externally connected, but do not touch within the concrete, the farther

-v are spaced apart in the concrete the less the corrosion will be. This

is the result of simply increasing the internal resistance of the galvanic

cell, thereby reducing the current flow. Walton, et a lit/ found that if they

decreased the spacing of steel and aluminum electrodes in a chloride- free

concrete from 4- inch separation to 1/8- inch separation, they increased the

total current flow by a factor of about three.

The final variable in this discussion is the ratio of the anode area to

the cathode area. Increasing this ratio reduces the current density at the

anode and thereby minimizes the corrosion damage per unit area. An excellent

example of this effect is the gypsum plaster- steel tie wire corrosion case.

The metal lath had been pre-painted to prevent rusting while exposed to the

weather on the job site ( a common practice). The painted lath was, thus,

electrically insulated from the system. This ^.eft only the steel tie -rives

acting as an anode. Consequently, the small exposed area of the tie wires

coupled to the large exposed area of the copper tubing (cathode) resulted in

a high current density at the anode. Had the lath not been painted, the

total area of the anode (steel lath plus tie wire) would have been tremendously

greater, resulting in a low, probably harmless, current density.
RECOMMENDATIONS

If dissimilar metals are to be used in cementing materials, the following

precautions are recommended;

1„ Avoid contact if practicable.

2 * Keep the electrical conductivity of the cementing material

to a minimum.

a. Forbid the use of CaCl^ or other ionic compounds;

alsoj, prevent the accidental or thoughtless contamination of the cementing material, such as for

example, by the use of sea water f6r mixing water.

b. Prevent abnormally delayed drying and subsequent

exposure to moisture.

3. Keep the ratio of the anode area to the cathode area at a

maximum. Do not coat the anode unless the coating will remain continuous or unless the intense localized corrosion that

may occur at a few discontinuities can be tolerated. An old

axiom in corrosion control is; If one of two dissimilar metals

is to be coated, coat the cathode .

4. Space the dissimilar metals as far apart as possible.

There are other more sophisticated methods of corrosion prevention for

specialized application^ , esuch as for example, impressed current techniques;

but these are beyond the scope of this paper.
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SUMMARY

A brief summary has been presented of some corrosion problems that have

developed in recent years because of the use of dissimilar metals embedded

in cementing materials. It was shown how the use of dissimilar metals embedded

in a cementing material forms a short-circuited galvanic cell battery. The

resulting corrosion of the anode has led to failures of steel-reinforced concrete

containing aluminum conduit and of gypsum plaster on metal lath, where the

plaster contained embedded copper tubing. Examples of failures were cited.

Some of the variables that affect the degree of corrosion were discussed and

some general precautionary measures were recommended.
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REFERENCES

1 /

Wright, T. E. "An Unusual Case of Corrosion of Aluminum Conduit in Concrete", The Engineering Journal, Oct. 1955, pp. 1357-62.

2 /

Monfore, G. E. and Ost, Borje, "Corrosion of Aluminum Conduit in Conf,. crete", Journal of the Portland Cement Association Research and Development Laboratories, Vol. 7, Noj 1, Jan, 1965, pp. 10-22.

3/

Private communication with J. R. Monto, Engineer in charge of repairing

D. C. Stadium, 1966.

4/

Author's unpublished data.

5/

Walton, C. J. , McGeary, F. L. and Englehart, E. T„, "Compatibility of

Aluminum with Alkaline Building Products", Corrosion, Vol. 13, Dec. 1957,

pp. 41-50.

6 / McGeary, F. L. "Performance of Aluminum in Concrete Containing Chlorides",

Journal of the American Concrete Institute, Feb. 1966, pp. 247-265.