Past experiences showed that some concrete constructions are significantly affected by the risk of cracking a short time after casting, due to hygrothermal phenomena such as shrinkage, heat development during cement hydration and temperature variations of surroundings. A numerical study on either shrinkage or thermal cracking in concrete walls is presented herein. Thin concrete walls are strongly exposed to the risk of early-age cracking due to both the low thickness and the large size. Aim of the analysis is to assess the influence of different factors, such as the degree of restraint between the wall and the slab foundation (1), both longitudinal and transverse steel reinforcement (2), geometry (3), mix composition (4) and construction phases (5). To this purpose, nonlinear structural and heattransfer analyses were performed. Models adopted for FE simulations and major numerical results are presented and discussed.
