Reinforcement corrosion may compromise the safety and serviceability of a reinforced concrete
structure. It is crucial to understand the causes of corrosion so that measures may be taken to guarantee
the safety and service life of a structure. The results of this study pertaining to the corrosion of
reinforcement indicate that the percentage of surface area corroded for both bare steel and epoxy coated
reinforcement increased with the presence of cracks. Also, the incidence of corrosion observed on the
two types of bars is not different. For the subset of bare steel reinforcement, 90% had some observed
corrosion, of which 25% was associated with a cracked core. For epoxy coated reinforcement, 85% had
some corrosion, of which 25% was associated with a cracked core. The condition of the coating, i.e.
number of damaged areas or the number of microscopic imperfections (holidays), is a crucial factor in
the amount of corrosion. The depth of the crack was determined to be a major factor in the amount of
observed corrosion in all reinforcement.