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Design and Calibration of a Large Open-Ended Coaxial Probe for the

Measurement of the Dielectric Properties of Concrete

Article  in  IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques · November 2008

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2322 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 56, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2008

Design and Calibration of a Large Open-Ended

Coaxial Probe for the Measurement of
the Dielectric Properties of Concrete
Bilal Filali, François Boone, Member, IEEE, Jamal Rhazi, and Gérard Ballivy

Abstract—The subject of this paper is the design and calibra-

tion of an open-ended coaxial probe for the nondestructive mea-
surement of the dielectric properties of concrete. Measurements
are made between 100–900 MHz, frequencies which are often used
in geophysics and civil engineering for ground penetrating radar
inspection. The probe is calibrated using measurements on saline
solutions in conjunction with three different mathematical tech-
niques for comparative study. Measurements of mortar and con-
crete specimens having different water/cement ratios were made
in order to observe the standard deviations due to their heteroge-
neous nature. Similar to the case of relatively homogeneous rock
specimens (limestone and granite), the standard deviation for het-
erogeneous concrete samples do not exceed 5%. In addition, the
effect of the concrete’s porosity on its dielectric properties was
clearly observed: measured permittivity between 4–4.5 at 900 MHz
for porous concrete, and between 6.5–7.5 at 900 MHz for dense con-
crete.
Index Terms—Complex permittivity, concrete heterogeneity,
probe admittance, reflection coefficient, scattering parameters.

I. INTRODUCTION
Fig. 1. Open-ended coaxial probe that was designed (all dimensions are in mil-
limeters).

G ROUND penetrating radar (GPR) is frequently used for

nondestructive inspection in geophysics and civil engi-
neering. It is a particularly interesting tool because of its pre-
(HP85070B) [4], but it is not reliable for materials that have ag-
cision, speed, and easy setup; for instance, radar systems can
gregates larger than 0.3 mm in diameter (concrete’s aggregates
be installed and used on a vehicle. When radar is used on con-
are at least 1 cm in diameter). The only previous research in
crete, the results are mainly influenced by the concrete’s di-
which a large coaxial probe (4-cm diameter) was used for con-
electric properties. The waves emitted from the radar source
crete measurement focused only on the detection of steel fiber
are only partially reflected due to these properties, allowing the
reinforcements without discussing any of the other properties of
localization of various layers and targets inside the concrete
concrete [5].
[1], [2]. Several probes have been used in the past to measure
Finally, the research done at the National Institute of Stan-
concrete’s electromagnetic (EM) properties. For example, [3]
dards and Technology (NIST), Boulder, CO, on coaxial probes
used a coaxial probe to measure the EM properties of mortar.
dealt mainly with the modeling of results in order to analyze
However, that probe’s calibration method has proven to be in-
thin-layer or multilayer samples [6], [7]. In those studies, ex-
adequate for our research study. A commercial probe exists
perimental measurements from 50 MHz up to 50 GHz were
made and discussed, but the probes used to make those mea-
Manuscript received December 12, 2007; revised May 27, 2008. First pub-
lished September 12, 2008; current version published October 8, 2008. This surements were not described. In this paper, we describe a large-
work was supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council band coaxial probe designed for concrete measurement. Since
of Canada (NSERC). This research was undertaken within the Industrial Chair traditional calibration methods are inadequate for our probe, we
framework of the NSERC for the concrete structures inspection (University of
Sherbrooke). discuss how the calibration was improved in order to obtain the
B. Filali, J. Rhazi, and G. Ballivy are with the Department of Civil En- true EM properties of concrete samples.
gineering, University of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada J1K 2R1
(e-mail: bilal.filali@usherbrooke.ca; jamal.rhazi@usherbrooke.ca; gerard.bal-
livy@usherbrooke.ca). II. COAXIAL PROBE PRINCIPLE
F. Boone is with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, A coaxial probe is a waveguide formed by two coaxial con-
University of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada J1K 2R1 (e-mail: Francois.
boone@usherbrooke.ca). ducting cylinders (Fig. 1). The interior cylinder is the core of
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TMTT.2008.2003520 the probe and has a diameter. The hollow external cylinder
0018-9480/$25.00 © 2008 IEEE
FILALI et al.: DESIGN AND CALIBRATION OF LARGE OPEN-ENDED COAXIAL PROBE FOR MEASUREMENT OF DIELECTRIC PROPERTIES OF CONCRETE
has a diameter . The gap between the two cylinders is
filled with a dielectric material. At the end of the waveguide, a
flat disc around the fringe ensures minimal field diffraction.
The designed probe has a 50- characteristic impedance and
operates at frequencies between 100–900 MHz. The internal and
external diameters ( and ) are 10 and 32.5 mm, respectively.
Aluminium with a conductivity of 3.77 10 S/m was used.
In order to connect the probe with a vector network analyzer
(VNA), a subminiature A (SMA) adapter is used.
The VNA is used to measure the reflection coefficient at the
input port of the probe when a sample is placed at the end of the
probe. The sample permittivity is deduced from its admittance
, obtained by solving the following equation [8]:
(1)
where is the modulus of the wave
vector, are cylindrical coordinates, and
, and and are, respectively,
the interior and the external radius of the probe.
The probe admittance can be obtained from the EM waves’
reflection coefficient at the contact interface with the sample
using the following relation [9]:
(2)
where is the probe admittance.
The measured reflection coefficient (using the VNA) is re-
lated to the real coefficient by the following expression [10]:
(3)
where ( ) are the probe scattering parameters.
The probe calibration, discussed in Section III, makes it possible
to determine the scattering parameters. Thus, by measuring , it
is possible to determine and then find the material permittivity
. expression (1) [8]. To do so, we replaced the capacitive approach
III. COAXIAL PROBE CALIBRATION
The calibration procedure consists of finding the param-
eters. This is done by measuring the total reflection coefficient
of three standards. This gives the three different reflection co-
efficients , , and associated to the three true coefficients
, , and . The latter must be deduced from the known ad-
mittances , , and using (2). -parameters are then deter-
mined by solving three independent equations, each having the
form of (3), and leading to the system (4), shown at the bottom
2323
of this page, involving three unknown parameters ,
and .
The standard samples used here are the short circuit
, the open circuit, and a sample of known permittivity. An
NaCl solution having a concentration of 30 parts per thousand
(ppt), whose permittivity is known through the Cole relation
[11], [12], was chosen as the sample. These standards are asso-
ciated to the , , and admittances, respectively. However,
is related to the permittivity by (1), whose resolution—ana-
lytically unknown—at all frequencies represents a major dif-
ficulty. To solve the equation numerically, a vast amount of
computing power is needed because of integration singulari-
ties. This makes instant measurement impossible. In order to
simplify the impedance expression (1), three main approaches
are developed, which are: 1) the capacitive approach [13]–[15];
2) the quasi-static approach [8], [16]–[18]; and the 3) Taylor-se-
ries development approach [19].
A. Calculations According to the Capacitive Approach
According to this approach, the coaxial probe admittance is
equivalent to that of a capacitor having a capacitance , which
varies linearly with according to [14], [15],
where is the capacitance of the probe waveguide and is its
fringing capacitance. Knowing the two previous characteristic
capacitances, the admittance of the probe can be deduced from
the following relation [3], [10]:
(5)
Once , , and are deduced, we can solve the system
(4) for the three unknown parameters , , and .
In order to verify that the obtained are true, permittivity
measurements are made on a 15-ppt saline solution. However,
differences between the theoretical and practical values were
found (Fig. 2). This can be due to the inapplicability of the ca-
pacitive approach to our coaxial probe, which would have re-
quired the consideration of the nonlinear terms in the admittance
by the quasi-static one.
B. Calculation According to the Quasi-Static Approach
In this approach, (1) is simplified to a polynomial form valid
for frequencies up to 10 GHz and for a probe with a 0.3675-cm
outer radius used to measure various dielectric materials [8].
This form is expressed as follows:
(6)
(4)
2324 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 56, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2008
Fig. 2. Measurements on the 15-ppt saline solution using conventional ap-
proaches. (a) Real part and (b) imaginary part of relative permittivity.
TABLE I
CALCULATED GEOMETRICAL PARAMETER VALUES
where and are factors that depend only on the probe ge-
ometry. For the designed probe, and have values given in
Table I.
By substitution in the system of (4), the coefficients are cal-
culated from the impedances found in (6). The measured permit-
tivity of the 15-ppt solution disagrees with the theory (Fig. 2).
This may be explained by the inapplicability of the quasi-static
approach at frequencies higher than 100 MHz. This frequency
limit is considerably lower than the 10 GHz limit studied in [8].
To verify this hypothesis and explain it, another calibration ap-
proach was devised using the Taylor-series development of (1),
which is more precise.
C. Calculations According to the Taylor-Series Development
The Taylor-series expansion of the exponential expression
is given by
(7)
The use of expansion (7) in the admittance expression (1)
gives the following admittance expression:
(8)
where
(9)
This expression of shows that these factors depend only
on the probe geometry. Thus, they are calculated only once,
by numerical integration, whatever the frequency and medium
characteristics. Since the sum in the expansion (7) goes to in-
finity, we have to truncate it to elements, leading to a con-
vergence problem. A convergence study was performed on the
saline 15-ppt solution and the results are presented in Fig. 3.
These results show that we have to take at least 20 terms of (7)
to obtain permittivity values very close to the theoretical values
ranging from 100 to 900 MHz. Our calculation results for ,
with varying from 1 to 20, are given in Table I. Note that the
development at orders higher than 20 did not allow exact mea-
surements at frequencies over 900 MHz. That is due to the fact
that the probe radiates at those frequencies, making (1) inappli-
cable. The probe begins to radiate when the wavelength used
gets close to the probe’s diameter (3.25 cm). The same obser-
vation is made in [19]. Thus, (1) is only valid for half-infinite
samples or samples that are sufficiently absorbant. That is not
the case for concrete, which has a finite thickness and is not very
absorbent.
The good results obtained with the 15-ppt saline solution
were replicated on the 10-, 20-, and 25-ppt solutions (Fig. 4).
Measurements were also taken on a limestone sample and
a granite sample. The average real part of the permittivity,
throughout the frequency range, is 7 for the limestone and 6
for the granite. These are similar to values given in [20]. All
the while, the imaginary part equals 0 due to the negligible
conductivity of these samples.
This confirms that the probe is reliable for solid samples. It is
nonetheless necessary that the samples have a polished surface
so as to guarantee good contact quality between the sample and
probe to such an extent as to mimic contact with a liquid as much
as possible.
These results show that the capacitive and quasi-static ap-
proaches are only applicable for probes of smaller size (diameter
from 3 to 6 mm) [17], whereas the approach using the Taylor-se-
ries development is a general approach that can be used in all
cases. This approach was used in particular in [19] for a small
probe functioning at very high frequencies. In that particular
case, the wavelength of guided waves was small, and the ratio
between the internal radius of the probe and the wavelength
was such that only the Taylor-series approach produced good
FILALI et al.: DESIGN AND CALIBRATION OF LARGE OPEN-ENDED COAXIAL PROBE FOR MEASUREMENT OF DIELECTRIC PROPERTIES OF CONCRETE
Fig. 3. Measured (solid line) and theoretical (dashed line) relative permittivity
 for saline 15-ppt solution for different values of N for calibration. (a) Real
part. (b) Imaginary part.
results. In our case, the probe’s internal radius is large, but the
frequencies used are low (from 100 to 900 MHz—frequencies
often used in GPR applications). Therefore, their wavelengths
are long. The resulting ratio between the internal radius and
wavelength lead us to use the Taylor-series approach. For a
probe of comparable size, Damme et al. [5] used an approach
similar to ours. However, in that study, the admittance of the
probe opening was calculated by a full-wave approach based on
a rational function. This lead to calculations that were long and
difficult. In our method, the calculation of the parameters is
independent of the frequency and of the characteristics of the
environment to be measured. The parameters only depend
on the geometry of the probe, which greatly reduces the calcu-
lation time for a large range of frequencies.
IV. APPLICATION TO CONCRETES AND MORTARS
To prove that the probe functions on concrete (heterogeneous
material), the permittivity of six concrete samples, dried in an
oven until mass stabilization, was measured using the coaxial
probe. Their resistance to compression and the modulus of their
elasticity are presented in Table II. Two tiles of mortar (MB and
2325
Fig. 4. Measured (solid line) and theoretical (dashed line) relative permittivity
 for four saline solutions. (a) Real part. (b) Imaginary part.
TABLE II
CONCRETE SAMPLE CHARACTERISTICS: F : COMPRESSIVE
STRENGTH; E: YOUNG’S MODULUS OF ELASTICITY
MC) were also examined. These two tiles were saturated with
water (polished and without granulates).
The concrete’s aggregates dimensions range between
5–20 mm, which is of the same order as the probe’s 32.5-mm
diameter. Thus, the concrete cannot be considered as homoge-
neous with our probe. In order to estimate the dispersion caused
by the sample heterogeneity, measurements at ten positions
were made on each sample (five positions on each face). The
means and standard deviations of the real and imaginary parts,
at 900 MHz, for all the samples, are given in Table III.
These values are close to those measured by [21] and [22]
using the transmission line technique. Reference [21] in par-
ticular gives measured results on mortar similar to MB. These
results are shown in Fig. 5, to which we added measurements
using our probe. Moreover, Fig. 6 shows the permittivity
measurements obtained at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute
and State University, Blacksburg, using a transmission line
technique [22]. These measurements are taken on two concrete
samples that are oven dried until mass stabilization and that
have different compressive strengths (42 and 35 MPa). Their
2326 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 56, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2008
TABLE III
MEASURED RELATIVE PERMITTIVITY MEANS AND STANDARD
DEVIATIONS OF SOLID SAMPLES AT 900 MHz
Fig. 5. Comparison between measured relative permittivity on mortar MB
sample using transmission line technique [21] and using our probe.
Fig. 6. Comparison between measured relative permittivity using transmission
line technique on two concrete samples and using our probe on concrete sample
B (31 MPa) and C (23 MPa).
real permittivity values are close to those obtained by the
coaxial probe and decrease similarly with frequency. Their
imaginary parts are lower, which can be explained by the fact
that their samples are drier.
This supports the applicability of the coaxial probe on con-
crete permittivity measurements. Moreover, except for concrete
sample D, the average of the standard deviations of all measure-
ments is 2.8%. This proves that the concrete aggregates do not
cause more dispersion than those of the limestone (considered
homogeneous) or of the granite (which is heterogeneous) on a
millimeter-length scale (Table III).
The higher observed value of the standard deviation in the
case of concrete sample D at 6.5% could be attributed to its
Fig. 7. Measured relative permittivity  on concrete specimens: real part and
imaginary part.
high water/cement ratio W/C of 0.84, giving it a nonhomoge-
neous porosity higher than the other samples. Indeed, the rela-
tive permittivity of the empty pores is clearly smaller
than that of the concrete, and thus, has more influence on the
permittivity fluctuation than the aggregates. With regard to the
saturated mortar samples, the standard deviations observed are
slightly higher than those of the concrete and vary from 4% to
6%. This cannot be attributed to the heterogeneity of the mor-
tars (millimeter-length scale), but rather to the nonhomogeneous
distribution of the water content. Indeed, the water-filled pores
have the same permittivity as water , considerably
higher than that of the aggregates and the cement paste. To
conclude, a nonhomogeneous distribution of the concrete water
content causes more permittivity fluctuations than the aggregate
dimensions.
The measurement comparisons for the samples A–D (Fig. 7)
shows that concrete sample A, with a mechanical compressive
strength of 80.1 MPa, has the highest permittivity (approx-
imately 6.2 at 900 MHz), while concrete samples B–D have
strengths of 31, 23, and 15 MPa, respectively. Their permittivi-
ties are approximately 5.5, 5.1, and 4.7, respectively. This result
indicates that the permittivity of dry concrete increases with its
compressive strength. In general, concrete with lower compres-
sive strength has higher porosity, which explains its low permit-
tivity. Indeed, porosity in a dry concrete implies more impris-
oned air in its medium, which strongly decreases the value of
its permittivity and conductivity (related to the imaginary part).
These observations support the usability of the coaxial probe for
EM measurements on the concrete permittivity. More results of
measurements have been already published in [23].
V. CONCLUSION
This paper has presented the design and use of an open-ended
coaxial probe to measure concrete’s dielectric properties. The
coaxial probe was built and calibrated at the Department of
Civil Engineering, University of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC,
Canada. Two calibration approaches, i.e., capacitive and quasi-
static, have proven to be inadequate. However, measurements
on four saline solutions gave coherent results for frequencies
ranging between 100–900 MHz with the theoretical Cole for-
mula using a Taylor-series development approach.
FILALI et al.: DESIGN AND CALIBRATION OF LARGE OPEN-ENDED COAXIAL PROBE FOR MEASUREMENT OF DIELECTRIC PROPERTIES OF CONCRETE
The technique was then successfully applied to solid sam-
ples: limestone, granite, mortar, and concrete. For limestone and
granite, the measured permittivities (approximately 7.2 and 6.5,
respectively) are in agreement with results from other studies.
Moreover, it was shown that the concrete’s heterogeneity (ag-
gregates from 5 to 20 mm, of the same size range as the 32.5-mm
probe fringe) do not cause significant errors. Indeed, standard
deviations are close to those of the limestone and the granite
case, which are homogeneous. In one particular case, when the
concrete was very porous or saturated, the standard deviation
was approximately 7%. This can be explained by either a non-
homogeneous distribution of the void or the water content.
The effect of the porosity on the permittivity was well
observed for the four oven-dried concrete samples. The re-
sults show that the permittivity of the most porous concrete,
containing more voids, is lower (between 4–4.5 at 900 MHz)
than that of the most compact samples (between 6.5–7.5 at
900 MHz). The results obtained indicate that the designed
coaxial probe can be used for the study of concrete’s dielectric
properties. The results have proven to be reliable, accurate, and
close to those obtained by the transmission line technique.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors thank the Industrial Chair partners for their
support, as well as Prof. P. Rivard, Department of Civil Engi-
neering, University of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada,
for his collaboration. The authors would also like to thank
the technical support staff, University of Sherbrooke, for their
contribution to the test processes.
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Bilal Filali received the Bachelor degree in physics
and Master degree in civil engineering from the Uni-
versity of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada in
2002 and 2004, respectively, and is currently working
toward the Ph.D. degree in applied science at the Uni-
versity of Sherbrooke.
Since 2002, he has been a Research Student the
Research Group on Monitoring and Instrumentation
(GRAI), Civil Engineering Department, University
of Sherbrooke.
François Boone (M’00) was born in Dijon, France.
He received the Eng. Dipl. degree in electrical
engineering from the École Nationale Supérieure
d’Électronique, d’Électrotechnique, d’Informa-
tique et d’Hydraulique de Toulouse (ENSEEIHT),
Toulouse, France, in 1992, the DEA degree in
microwave engineering from the Institut National
Polytechnique de Toulouse (INPT), Toulouse,
France, in 1993, and the M.Sc.A and Ph.D. degrees
in microwave engineering from the École Polytech-
nique de Montréal, Montréal, QC, Canada, in 1997
and 2000, respectively.
In October 1999, he joined the Faculty of Engineering, Department of Elec-
trical and Computer Engineering, University of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC,
Canada, where he is currently an Associate Professor. His research interests
concern analysis, modeling, and design of passive and active microwave and
millimeter-wave components and circuits.
2328 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 56, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2008

Jamal Rhazi received the Bachelor degree in Gérard Ballivy has been with the Department
physics, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in applied of Civil Engineering, University of Sherbrooke,
acoustics from the Université du Maine, Maine, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada, since 1976, where he is
France, in 1982, 1984, and 1987, respectively. currently a Professor. In 1977, he founded the Lab-
Since 1990, he has been with the Department of oratory of Rock Mechanics and Applied Geology,
Civil Engineering, University of Sherbrooke, Sher- University of Sherbrooke. He is the principal inves-
brooke, QC, Canada, where he is currently an Ad- tigator of the Centre for Research on infrastructure
junct Professor. His primary research interests are in concrete (CRIB). With the Rock Mechanics Labo-
the area of nondestructive testing of concrete struc- ratory, University of Sherbrooke, he has developed
tures. new testing techniques for the design of rock foun-
dations and participated in numerous programs for
laboratories and consulting engineering firms. He is Head of a Natural Sciences
and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)–Industrial Research
Chair on the auscultation of concrete structures, which has been approved
for two terms (2001–2006 and 2006–2011). The Chair has the support of 11
industrial partners and government. He has authored or coauthored over 100
scientific papers. His research concerns the field of geomechanics applied to
civil engineering. He conducts original research on auscultation and instrumen-
tation on concrete or rocks infrastructures in service, on the development and
characterization of high-performance cement grout injection, etc.

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