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The purpose of this study was to select an atmospheric corrosion evaluation methodology and to establish a range of relative corrosion penetration and/or progress values, which could be used as reference in the selection of materials for the civil construction industry.

Salt spray, field tests, accelerated cyclic tests and accelerated field tests were used to evaluate atmospheric corrosion resistance of civil construction materials. The cyclic accelerated test and the field test with saline solution spray were found to be appropriate for atmospheric corrosion resistance evaluation.

The corrosion resistance of aluminium killed mild steel, aluminium killed copper added steel, and electrogalvanized steels, all phosphatized and painted, were evaluated by field and accelerated corrosion tests. Of the materials studied, aluminium killed mild steel showed the least resistance to atmospheric corrosion. The use of aluminium killed copper added steel is recommended for material specification in the civil construction industry.

Salt sprays are not adequate to evaluate atmospheric corrosion resistance. There are other cyclic tests that could be tested in future work.

Brazilian technical standards, which specify the metallic materials used in the civil construction industry, will be changed in order to include the construction steel corrosion resistance evaluation methodology, which is proposed in this paper. As a result, the tendency of the construction materials lifetime is set to increase.

This paper contributes to the improvement of the Brazilian Technical Standard by the inclusion of an atmospheric corrosion resistance requirement.