rectangular underground concrete vault built with single rebar mats in walls

[ktcastro]

I have a question, what are the possible fails for a rectangular underground concrete vault built with single rebar mats in walls without connecting the Rebar mats with "L" bars at corners 12" o.c. vertical spaced as typical. In other words none continuous reinforcement at corners.

 

[jayrod12]

If you have no corner bars, what's stopping the walls from creating cracks there?

Also, where I practice at least, any wall 8" and thicker need 2 layers of reinforcing, one on each face.

Lastly, if the vault is intended on being fluid retaining, you may want to look into the codes regarding water retaining concrete structures, it usually limits the spacing of reinforcing to 8" or less.

 

[ktcastro]

Correct, and deformation once the structure is backfilled if poured that way. Thanks for the comment, just trying to complete more training information.

 

[JAE]

I thought ACI only required double mats in walls thicker than 10".

Single mats in thinner walled vaults are used all the time but usually with L bars in the corners as jayrod12 suggests.
But if you have a very small vault (i.e. maybe 3 ft. in size or smaller) then corner bars might not be the end of the world.