Author(s)

LEANDRO D. DOMENECH, AGUSTÍN SPALVIER, GONZALO MOLTINI, ALINA B. AULET & GONZALO P. CETRANGOLO

Abstract

The concept and use of reinforced brick masonry (rbm) has a long history. engineer eladio Dieste was one of the most renowned innovators in the rbm field. One of Dieste’s outstanding rbm buildings is church of christ the Worker (1958–1960) in Atlántida, uruguay. even though the structure has been maintained by the local community, it has begun to show signs of aging. In August 2016 the church was selected by Keeping It Modern, an international grant program developed by the Getty Foundation with focus on the conservation of important buildings. This article presents the inspection of Dieste’s church, by means of visual inspection and non-destructive evaluation (NDe), performed under this program. Several NDe techniques – infrared thermography, ground penetrating radar, penetration resistance and ultrasonic testing – were applied to assess the state of conservation of the structure. The visual inspection and NDe yielded results associated with various symptoms of initiated deterioration mechanisms: presence of moisture, corrosion of some steel bars and degradation of mortars. Despite these pathologies that are commonly present in aged rbm structures, the church is in a good state of preservation. This fact reveals the impressive care with which it was designed and built.

Keywords

Eladio Dieste, evaluation, historical structure, NDE, reinforced brick masonry