The Comité Euro-International du Béton has always paid special attention to the problem of the structural effects of the rheological properties of concrete. The early editions of the CEB Recommendations already incorporated a model for the prediction of creep and shrinkage. A decisive step towards more comprehensive information and guidance on the related structural problems was taken with the publication of the 1978 Model Code, which contained a complete appendix on the subject.

In 1984, the CEB published the Design Manual Structural Effects of Time-Dependent Behaviour of Concrete, aimed specifically at widening the scope and facilitating the application of these guidelines. It was a pleasure for me at the time to present the Manual and to commend it to the design profession as an innovative tool for transforming the evaluation of creep effects in reinforced and prestressed concrete structures, as well as in composite steel–concrete structures, from rough estimates based on engineering judgement or inadequate simplifications into systematic procedures founded on rational assumptions and appropriate models, within the general framework of reliability verification.

The CEB Manual has, over the past years, made a significant contribution to the dissemination within the engineering community of such a rational approach.

After the publication of the new CEB-FIP Model Code 1990, which incorporates a revised model for the prediction of creep and shrinkage, it became necessary to revise—in this CEB Bulletin—the 1984 Manual, particularly with regard to the set of design aids in the form of diagrams for the main rheological functions governing various structural problems. This Bulletin also benefits from recent advances in the development of simplified yet very accurate approximate methods for the solution of practical problems.

It is therefore once again a pleasure for me to present this CEB Bulletin, which will certainly be appreciated by structural engineers as a useful tool for adapting their design procedures for creep effects to the new guidelines of the CEB-FIP Model Code 1990.

Once more, Mario Alberto Chiorino, who bore the main responsibility for the former Manual, has directed the preparation of this Bulletin, and I am pleased to acknowledge his work as well as that of his collaborator G. Lacidogna.