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Rheological optimisation for flowable mixture compositions specified for African boundary conditions
(2013)
To date concrete technology is not yet well established in sub-Saharan Africa but considering the construction technological challenges of the region, without doubt, concrete will play a major role in future. The social, economic, and geographic boundary conditions distinguish greatly from those that can be found in many other regions of the world, where concrete is considerably well established. Düring the last decades, concrete technology underwent a rapid evolution process, but in most countries, where concrete is already well established, innovations are difficult to be brought into practice, Africa, currently has the opportunity and potential, of directly establishing the best available practice in concrete technology.
The conclusion is drawn that self-compacting concrete (SCC) or highly flowable concrete is a reasonable solution for African construction sites. Since on most African construction sites the disadvantageous concreting environment is the most crucial factor for the concrete quality, the outstanding workability properties outweigh any disadvantages of SCC.
Based on this consideration, concepts are developed, how to bring about robust SCC cost-efficiently and reliably into practice as pre-mixed dry compound under consideration of local materials such as rice husk ashes, bagasse ashes, natural pozzolans, cassava starch and lignosulphonate.
Innovative admixture technology has significantly widened up the ränge of possibilities of concrete engineers. For many decades the water to cement ratio (w/c) was the major influencing factor for the performance of concrete. Due to the need to adjust a consistency, which still allowed reasonable workability, the w/c was typically significantly higher than technologically reasonable. Rheology modifying admixtures Support adjusting the concrete consistency largely independent of the w/c. It was only after the invention of the first superplasticizers that modern concrete technology significantly evolved in terms of flowability, strength, and durability, and only due to the steady evolution of the technology modern innovations, such as Self-Compacting Concrete, Ultra-High-Performance Concrete, or Engineered Cementitious Composites were made possible. Today’s superplasticizers are extremely versatile and can be adjusted to individual technologicalspecifications. However, the other side of the coin of versatility is that cementitious Systems incorporating superplasticizers have become more sensitive against environmental influences, such as the environmental temperature, which may cause unwanted effects or demand for supplementary admixture use such as stabilizing admixtures. Hence, concrete mixture composition with admixtures demands for a high level of expertise and offen there is lack of awareness about the mode of Operation of rheology modifying admixtures among concrete technologists. The paper gives a comprehensive overview about rheology modifying admixtures such as superplasticizers or stabilizing agents, and how they can be used depending upon the application in the most favourable way. Based on experiences with the sub-Saharan African concreting boundary conditions, which exhibit many challenges in terms of environmental boundary conditions and construction site logistics, conclusions are finally drawn, how admixtures can be used in the most beneficial way to improve the concrete casting Situation.
Flowable concretes can differ significantly from traditional vibrated concrete. Concrete types like self-compacting concrete (SCC), ultra high performance concrete (UHPC) and high performance fibre reinforced cementitious composites (HPFRCCs) require novel mix design approaches. This has consequences for the production and the performance in the hardened state. Mix designs for flowable concretes can incorporate a wide variety of innovative admixtures or components: e.g. superplasticisers increase the flowability and allow for significant reduction of the water content, shrinkage compensating admixtures or superabsorbent polymers support sound and damage free curing processes, viscosity modifying admixtures enhance the robustness, and new fibre types allow for sophisticated and tailored structural performance.
The new Model Code has limitations regarding the application of flowable concrete, e.g. thresholds for the minimum aggregate size and the maximum strength. Provisions are added to include fibres for structural design. fib Task Group 4.3 aims at facilitating the use of innovative flowable materials for designing concrete structures and considers three aspects of flowable concrete: material properties, production effects and structural boundary conditions and performance. This paper reports about the progress of fib TG 4.3 related to the mix design of flowable concrete and discusses the present state-of-the-art concerning admixtures and robustness.
There is a wide range of research worldwide on supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) such as fly ash and slag for substituting pure cement. Such materials are suitable to be considered in a cementitious system with ordinary Portland cement (OPC) due to their high pozzolanic properties. In addition, majority of the SCMs are said to significantly improve concrete properties especially in terms of increased strength and durability. Unfortunately, the production of such SCMs is not entirely eco-friendly and also limited to certain parts of the world, hence one has to look at alternative options.
The issue of availability of resources is a strong concept that is ever-increasing, and the use of more eco-friendly SCMs in a cementitious system is furthermore attractive. Hence this paper addresses the use of eco-friendly SCMs in concrete such as rice husk ash (RHA). Despite the fact that extensive research has been done on this material, its application in a cementitious system to obtain sufficient concrete properties is still rather limited. In a country like Tanzania, high strength concrete construction is applicable in special construction cases but certainly not a high priority. Majority of construction is still undertaken using normal strength concrete. In a ternary cementitious system consisting of OPC, RHA and other readily available resources such as limestone filler (LSF), normal strength concrete can still be produced having good performance and suitable for regular on-site construction. This paper explains a possible application of obtaining sufficient concrete properties from the available resources.
There is a wide range of research worldwide on supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) such as fly ash and slag for substituting Portland cement. Such materials are suitable to be considered in a cementitious system with ordinary Portland cement (OPC) due to their high pozzolanic properties. In addition, many of the SCMs are said to significantly improve concrete properties especially in terms of strength and durability. Unfortunately, the production of such SCMs is not entirely eco-friendly and also limited to certain parts of the world, hence one has to look at alternative options.
The issue of availability of resources is a strong concept that is ever-increasing, and the use of more eco-friendly SCMs in a cementitious system is furthermore attractive. Hence this paper addresses the use of eco-friendly SCMs in concrete such as rice husk ash (RHA). Despite the fact that extensive research has been done on this material, its application in a cementitious system to obtain sufficient concrete properties is still rather limited.
In a country like Tanzania, high strength concrete construction is applicable in special construction cases but certainly not a high priority. Majority of construction is still undertaken using normal strength concrete. In a ternary cementitious system consisting of OPC, RHA and other readily available resources such as limestone filler (LSF), normal strength concrete can still be produced having good performance and suitable for regular on-site construction. This paper explains a possible application of obtaining sufficient concrete properties from the available resources.
Today, concrete engineers can vary consistencies between very stiff and self-compacting. The possibility to tailor rheological properties of concrete eventually opened up the path to multiple new technologies, where design criteria are no longer limited to the Young’s modulus and the compressive strength, but often comprise additional added value. It can therefore be concluded that the capability to control the rheology of concrete systems can be considered as the catalyst for concrete innovations such as polymer modified cementitious composites (PCC) self-compacting concrete (SCC), high-performance concrete (HPC), ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) or strain hardening cement based composites (SHCC). In the same way rheology modifying admixtures will become key parameters in mastering the challenges of the next decades such as:
- Additive manufacturing/3D-printing
- Overcoming pumping height limitations
- Casting at extreme temperatures
- Tailored rheology at delivery
In many regions in the Southern hemisphere, and particularly in Africa, the effective use of chemical admixtures for concrete could significantly contribute to solve problems induced by the challenging climatic conditions, but particularly in Africa it is difficult to use them, due to lacking local supply and supply infrastructure. For Africa, concrete admixtures are largely shipped or transported from Europe, the Arabian Peninsula, or Asia. The long distance transportation of chemicals is not very environmentally friendly and the economic consequences are dramatic: the agents are difficult to purchase, expensive, and there is not a large variety of products available in the market.
However, bio-based chemicals have been used in construction for ages effectively. Due to the enormous relevance of rheology modifying admixtures it is worthwhile to recollect that nature provides an enormous variety of chemicals that can be used readily or with low processing. Today, the use of petrol based polycarboxylate ether superplasticizers has become quite common in concrete technology due to their versatility, but their uncomplicated and cost efficient availability is limited in most countries in Africa. However, alternatives are available, which can be found in many regions.
Plant extracts have been used to modify the properties of concrete for long time. These plants are typically regionally abundantly available, cheap, and they are environmental friendly. They do not require special caring for seedlings, weeding or manuring to grow since they grow wildly.
The talk will present an overview of various options for rheology modifying admixtures, that can be found in nature, and that may become a real alternative, once their interaction within the complex cementitious system is well understood.
Building materials consist of cement, water and chemical admixtures, which adjust cement paste properties. They can act beyond their aimed functions causing changes in hydration course. The mechanisms are still under investigation. We investigate cement hydration in levitated droplets using an ultrasonic levitator. Hydrate phase formation is followed in situ by synchrotron XRD. The data allows detailed conclusions about the mechanisms of the admixture action in the ongoing hydration reactions.
Chemical admixtures are widely used to adjust properties of the cementitious mixtures. Different superplasticizers (SP) are typically added to improve the flowability of the fresh cement paste. Their working period is the initial stage of the cement hydration from its beginning until stiffening. Currently, polycarboxylate-based SP (PCE-SP) are the most effective ones. They can act beyond their aimed function causing changes in the hydration course, e. g. retardation effects. The exact mechanisms and influencing factors are still under investigation. However, the occurrence of the retardation effect indicates the involvement of PCE in the hydration reactions. Some observations indicate, that the retardation depends on the type, molecular structure and concentration of PCE, and the presence of other admixtures (stabiliser, ST). These factors influence further the working time of admixture and its amount related efficacy in the flow improvement.
We investigate the cement hydration process in situ in levitated droplets. High resolution synchrotron X-ray diffraction allows gathering temporal course of the hydration reactions. The measurement setup is based on an ultrasonic levitator allowing in situ investigation of the temporal changes of the phase composition in the hydrating cementitious system. Further, the hydration can be followed ab initio avoiding the time loss for the sample preparation and filling in the sample holder. The collected data allows to conclude about the mechanisms of the admixture action and their involvement into the ongoing hydration process.