This research project will investigate the effect of Early Age Cycling (EAC) on Grouted Connections (GC) which are widely employed for fixed-bottom offshore wind turbine substructures such as monopiles or jackets. Within this scope a small scale apparatus will be designed, to study EAC on GCs using physical modelling under varying conditions. The collected experimental data will be further validated using numerical simulations. This pilot study will act as a first step to increase our understanding on the influence of EAC and quantifying its impact on the long term performance of GCs for offshore wind structures.
