Annexure I

Paper Number XX

2ndR.N. RaikarInternational Conferenceand Banthia-Basheer International Symposium On Advances in Science and

Technology of Concrete, 18-19 December 2015, Mumbai, India

Production of M60 Grade of Concrete in Difficult &

Underdeveloped Conditions

ABSTRACT:
Under the conditions where material supply quality and quantity including choices of brands of
additives & admixtures are very limited it could be very difficult task to make decision what grade & quality
of major construction materials like concrete to be used for the first time. Economic challenges sometimes
could be so high that one has no choice but to take up the challenge.
Approach to the mix design for M60 grade of concrete was to look at what has been done in the
past to achieve this grade of concrete with high workability as in our case it was going to be used in the
circular columns of 600mm diameter. The Building this M60 grade of concrete is going to be used has
been registered with LEED USA for their certification, most probably platinum/gold, so concrete to be
used must use 20%of recycledcementationsmaterials replacing OPC. Therefore, this component is
already fixed. M60 grade of concrete is going to be used in Kathmandu, where day temperature in
summer is around 33 degree C and occasionally goes as high as 36 degree C. Therefore OPC 53 grade
can be safely used.
All the concrete is going to be batched manually and also all the additive & admixture to be
measured manually. Therefore, the mix has to be versatilei.e. its workability must not change much with
minor changes of moisture content and if possible with minor changes in quantity of admixture.
Consistency of mix in workability and in strength is extremely important. Please refer to the analysis of the
28days crushing strengths of 130number of sample taken over year (Appendix-1). The Standard
Deviation is 2.37only and coefficient of deviation is 3.85. Therefore it can be concluded that design mix is
very good in the view that batching was done manually. Also concrete was made throughout the year i.e.
seasonal affect in moisture content did not affect the strength much. All manual batching can produce
consistent quality of high grade/high performance concrete in the difficult and technically under developed
Conditions.

INTRODUCTION
High Strength /High Performance Concrete is the need of the day as in highly densely build up
area like Kathmandu where the construction area is very small. Consequently, Basements are going

deeper and above ground construction are going higher and higher. To meet the challenge, leading
architects, structural designers and concrete technologists started to investigate the possibilities of
making High- Strength / High- Performance concrete at site with manual batching in drum mixer
machines.
Due to Earthquake risk, high rise buildings are very slowly picking up. Therefore, High Strength/
High- Performance concrete is also slowly coming in use. Concrete industry as such is very much in
infant stage with only two Ready mix Plants operating in the country. Almost all concrete is mixed at sites
in the batching plants for large projects and by drum mixer machines of normally 50-100 kilograms
cement per batch of concrete capacity.
For new corporate building of M/S HAMA IRON & STEEL Pvt. Ltd. at Kathmandu, it was decided to
use highest achievable grade of concrete and with the consent of concrete technologist the grade of
concrete was finalized as 60MPa @ 28 day cube strength. The above building was registered at LEED,
USA for their certification possibilityplatinum. As per LEEDS requirement for concrete to be used in the
construction of building,we must use minimum of 20% recycled cementations material as replacement to
OPC, to be qualified as green concrete.
Looking at very slow development of the High -Strength / High Performance concrete in Nepal,
there could three factors:
1. Poor demand
2. Site mixed concrete as common practice
3. Supply of aggregates, chemical and even cement has not been dependable in quality and
even in quantity.
Poor demand due to only few high rise buildings are coming up. This may be due high risk as Nepal
being Earthquake prone area. Recently, Earthquake of magnitude 7.8 Richter scale struck the country
and did lot of damage to high rise building in Kathmandu.
Mostly concrete is mixed at site till this date. Due to this practice structural designers do not have
confidence in production of high grade concrete consistently by the contractors. At site contractor do not
have skilled manpower to batch multi blend additive and admixtures of various types and in doses for
large concreting works.
Supply of material for high greatconcrete is very much uncertain. In and around of Kathmandu good
quality course aggregate is getting scare. Recently there was total stoppage in production & supply of
aggregates for several months. Cement supply also is uncertain in quality and in quantity. High grade
concrete suffers most from these uncertainties, Imports are also often not regular. Cementitious
supplementary additive which are very much required to produce high grade concrete, their sources of
supply,their quality and prices are not known to many buyers & users. Therefore, it is very difficult to get
good material at reasonable price. Therefore, production of High -Strength /High-Performance concrete
suffers a lot due to this shortcoming.
Similar is the situation with regard to chemical admixtures. This shortcoming is the biggest
drawback in producing High -Strength./ High -Performance concrete. Now we can see that producing
High -Strength.-High -Performance concrete here in Nepal is very much risky decision but progress must
go on. So, production of M60 grade concrete has been started recently. There are certain conditions we
have to meet in the Mix Design we are going to do. They are:

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

OPC quantity to be used, 20% of this has to be replaced by recycled cementitious material.
Slump 110mm minimum
Course Aggregate maximum size 20mm
Concrete should flow when vibrated
Concrete should be versatile i.e. slump should not change much with changes in water content&
within short duration of time of mixing concrete.

Keeping above conditions in mind, several trial mix were tried and concrete cubes were tested for
minimum period of 56days. Finally one was selected which met all above conditions. This has been
shown as works cube ID1 for various period of testing.

Materials were selected on the following basis:

1.
2.
3.
4.

Meets all the technical quality requirement

quality is consistent
Constant supply of ingredient construction material is ensured
Price is nominal and variations is small over the year

Methodology followed for quality control

1. Aggregate Quality Every time new supply of aggregate arrive at site, aggregate were tested for
grading and also for crusting strength etc. specially when it appears to be different than approved
aggregate. Especially sand was stacked under cover andon sloping ground with brick soling.
Moisture content of aggregate was measured at least once before mixing first batch of concrete
and added water quantity was decided on this finding of moisture content. Therefore total water
content was always consistent in the concrete. As is could be seen in the mix design the water in
the chemical admixture was also taken into account.
2. Slump were measured regularly and when in doubt of slump of concrete,
3. Test cubes making curing & testing of all the test cubes were made as per British Standard
practice. These Cubes were cured in the temperature control. Water tank and tested at right time
as per British Standard procedures.

Conclusion
Following are advantages of mix design of M60 grade of concrete used
1. At site by manual batching High -Strength/High -Performance concrete of consistent quality,
strength and workability can be produced over a long period of time.
2. To use high strength concrete in built up congested areawhere land price is very high, it is highly
economical for contractor and the owner. To builder/contractor it is not only money saving in
material but also cost of labor for handling reduced quantity including time saving.
3. Continuous increase of concrete strength during long period of time gives huge safety factor
againstnatural disaster. And accidental over loading including miscalculation by structural design
designer.
4. Due to pozzolanicreaction it is more dense concrete than using only OPC therefore more water
proofconcrete so less prone to chemical and more safety to reinforcing steel bars.

5. Mix is very versatile and slump does not change due to small changes in water content &
therefore it is user finely which has huge advantage for use in under developed area& not so
much skilled workforce is required.
6. Present days practice of using 28 days cube crushing strength, as design strength which can be
replaced by 56 days cube crushing strength. Therefore saving can be achieved if we follow
similar line of mix Design and use 56 days cube strength as design strength.

ACKNDWLEDGEMENT:
Author would like to thank Mr. Malay Sahof M/S SWC INDIA for giving solid & liquid
content of SUPAPLAST-PC