TRAINING COURSE SERIES No. 17 
                 Guidebook on 
          non-destructive testing of 
              concrete structures 
           INTERNATIONAL ATOMIC ENERGY AGENCY, VIENNA, 2002
                 The originating Section of this publication in the IAEA was: 
                    Industrial Applications and Chemistry Section 
                       International Atomic Energy Agency 
                          Wagramer Strasse 5 
                            P.O. Box 100 
                         A-1400 Vienna, Austria 
                  GUIDEBOOK ON NON-DESTRUCTIVE TESTING OF 
                        CONCRETE STRUCTURES 
                          IAEA, VIENNA, 2002 
                           IAEA–TCS–17 
                           ISSN 1018–5518 
                           © IAEA, 2002 
                        Printed by the IAEA in Austria 
                           September 2002
                      FOREWORD 
      The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been active in the promotion of non-
      destructive testing (NDT) technology for many years. NDT is an important component of a 
      number of IAEA regional projects successfully executed or currently being executed. These 
      are the Regional Co-operative Arrangements for the Promotion of Nuclear Science and 
      Technology in Latin America (ARCAL), the Regional Co-operative Agreement for Research, 
      Development and Training Related to Nuclear Science and Technology for Asia and the 
      Pacific (RCA), the African Regional Co-operative Agreement for Research, Development and 
      Training Related to Nuclear Science and Technology (AFRA) and, more recently, the NDT 
      Regional Project in West Asia. Under these regional projects many regional and national 
      training courses are conducted. Since the IAEA relies heavily on experts from Member States 
      to conduct training courses, it is necessary to have agreed syllabi, training guidelines and 
      training material not only to guide the experts but also to provide some consistency between 
      courses and resultant uniformity in the training provided. 
      The syllabi for training courses that cover the conventional NDT methods are available in 
      IAEA-TECDOC-628. This TECDOC covers the conventional methods of liquid penetrant 
      testing, magnetic particle testing, eddy current testing, radiographic testing, ultrasonic testing, 
      visual inspection and leak testing. 
      Based on these syllabi, training course notes have been produced to cover Industrial 
      Radiography (IAEA Training Course Series No. 3) and Ultrasonic Testing of Materials at 
      Level 2 (IAEA Training Course Series No. 10). 
      These training course notes deal predominantly with the NDT of metallic materials. While 
      NDT of metallic materials is a very important application, NDT is being used increasingly for 
      the inspection of concrete structures. Training Course Series Nos. 3 and 10 cover the 
      inspection of concrete using the relevant NDT method; however, coverage is brief and does 
      not present the whole range of NDT methods used for the NDT of concrete. Concrete has 
      become a very common construction material in most IAEA Member States and problems 
      have occurred because of faulty construction practice. A need was therefore identified for a 
      guidebook on the NDT of concrete. The first IAEA Training Course on the NDT of Concrete 
      and other Non-Metallic Materials was held in 1987 in Japan, at the Japanese Society for Non-
      Destructive Inspection. Subsequent courses/workshops were held in Thailand and Singapore. 
      In 1998, AFRA national co-ordinators prepared a draft syllabus on the NDT of Concrete. This 
      syllabus was circulated for comment to national co-ordinators in other IAEA projects. 
      R.S. Gilmour (Australia) compiled the first draft of the training material, which was circulated 
      to the national NDT co-ordinators for the NDT subproject in different RCA countries. IAEA 
      experts discussed the amendments made to this draft at a Meeting on the NDT of concrete in 
      the Malaysian Institute for Nuclear Technology (MINT), Malaysia in September 1999. 
      During the compilation of this manuscript, guidance and support were provided by 
      Abd Nassir Ibrahim from Malaysia and G. Singh from India. The IAEA officer responsible 
      for this publication was A.A. Khan of the Division of Physical and Chemical Sciences. 
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