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Geopolymer Concrete Strength Development
Geopolymer Concrete Strength Development
Abstract: In this paper, setting time, strength and bond of high-calcium fly ash geopolymer concrete were investigated. The high-calcium fly
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ash was from Mae Moh power plant in northern Thailand. Both sodium silicate solution and sodium hydroxide solution were used as alkali
activators in every mix. Sodium hydroxide solution with 10 M, 15 M, and 20 M concentrations, sodium silicate to sodium hydroxide ratios
of 1.0 and 2.0, alkaline liquid to fly ash ratio of 0.5 and two curing regimes viz., heat curing at 60 2°C for 24 h and room temperature curing
at 23 2°C were used. The results indicated that fresh geopolymer concrete had short setting time of 28–58 min due to the presence of
high calcium content of fly ash. In general, strengths and modulus of elasticity increased with the increase in NaOH concentration.
For compressive strength, the optimum Na2 O content was around 12% of fly ash. The high-strength geopolymer concrete with 28-day
compressive strength of 54.4 MPa was obtained for mix with 15M NaOH. The modulii of elasticity of geopolymer concrete were related
to the compressive strengths and comparable to those of portland cement concrete. The tensile splitting strength and bond strength were also
related to the compressive strength and the values were higher than those of portland cement concrete. In particular, the bond strengths were
significantly higher than those given by the current design code. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)MT.1943-5533.0001157. © 2014 American Society
of Civil Engineers.
Author keywords: High-calcium fly ash; Geopolymer concrete; Mechanical properties; Bond strength.
Introduction material rich in SiO2 and Al2 O3 , activated by alkaline solution such
as sodium hydroxide (NaOH) or potassium hydroxide (KOH) and
The global production of portland cement (PC) increases every year sodium silicate (Na2 SiO3 ) solution with the help of elevated tem-
and has shown no sign of slowing down (USGS 2013). Large perature (Davidovits 2008). Geopolymers, in general, exhibit good
amount of natural resources such as limestone, fossil fuels, electric- mechanical properties, high durability, and strength maintenance in
ity, and natural gas are required in PC production. High tempera- extreme conditions such as elevated temperatures, high corrosion,
tures are required in the production of PC, and this has resulted in a and high radiation (Binici 2013; Kong and Sanjayan 2008; Sata
larger amount of carbon dioxide (CO2 ) emission into the atmos- et al. 2012; Sufian Badar et al. 2014).
phere. In Thailand, approximately 33 million tons of portland Fly ash is commonly used to produce geopolymers due to its
cement were produced in 2012 (USGS 2013). availability around the world. Fly ash is classified as either class C
In an effort to reduce the growth of PC consumption, alternative or class F according to its chemical composition. It has been shown
pozzolanic materials such as fly ash, slag, palm oil fuel ash, bagasse that low-calcium fly ash-based geopolymer concretes (LCGC) have
ash, and rice husk ash are used as alternative cementitious materials similar mechanical properties to concretes produced with PC
to replace part of portland cement (Chindaprasirt et al. 2007c; (Hardjito and Rangan 2005). In Thailand, approximately three
Sata et al. 2007; Tangchirapat et al. 2009). These materials are by- million tons of fly ash is produced from lignite coal-fired Mae
products from industrial processes and thus require less energy to Moh power station in Lampang province. This fly ash contains
produce compared to PC production. These pozzolanic materials relatively high calcium oxide content, typically around 12–25% by
contain rich silica (SiO2 ) and alumina (Al2 O3 ) and can also be used weight. According to previous researches, geopolymer paste and
to produce geo-binder when mixed with alkaline solutions. Geopol- mortar produced from high-calcium fly ash exhibited good strength
ymers or “chains or networks of mineral molecules linked with co- and durability (Chindaprasirt et al. 2010; Chindaprasirt et al. 2007c;
valent bonds” can be produced from aluminosilicate, an inorganic Wongpa et al. 2010). Rattanasak and Chindaprasirt (2009) reported
that leaching of silica and alumina was enhanced at high concen-
1
Ph.D. Candidate, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, tration of NaOH and thus a high strength geopolymer was normally
Khon Kaen Univ., Khon Kaen 40002, Thailand. E-mail: p.toparkngarm@ obtained with a high concentration NaOH solution.
gmail.com One of the problems with high-calcium fly ash is the fast setting
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Professor, Sustainable Infrastructure Research and Development due to the presence of calcium and the formation of calcium silicate
Center, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Khon Kaen hydrate and/or calcium aluminate silicate hydrate (Chindaprasirt
Univ., Khon Kaen 40002, Thailand (corresponding author). E-mail: et al. 2012). The use of high NaOH concentration in the high-
prinya@kku.ac.th calcium fly ash geopolymer can prolong the setting by limiting the
3
Assisstant Professor, Sustainable Infrastructure Research and Develop- leaching of calcium and allows normal geopolymerization process
ment Center, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Khon
to control the setting of paste (Hanjitsuwan et al. 2014).
Kaen Univ., Khon Kaen 40002, Thailand. E-mail: vancsa@kku.ac.th
Note. This manuscript was submitted on March 6, 2014; approved on In the utilization of geopolymer concrete, the reinforcement is
July 1, 2014; published online on August 19, 2014. Discussion period open an important aspect (Esfahani and Rangan 1998). Since concrete is
until January 19, 2015; separate discussions must be submitted for indivi- weak in tension, bond strength between rebar and concrete is thus a
dual papers. This paper is part of the Journal of Materials in Civil Engi- critical strength to transfer externally applied load from concrete to
neering, © ASCE, ISSN 0899-1561/04014198(7)/$25.00. rebar. Sarker (2011) and Sofi et al. (2007a) indicated that bond
calcium fly ash geopolymer concrete (HCGC) were investigated. were calculated from Na2 O in fly ash, sodium hydroxide, and
sodium silicate solutions.
The modulus of elasticity was determined at the age of 28 days The results of compressive strength of HCGC are shown in
Table 3. The compressive strengths of HCGC at 7 and 28 days were
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0
fc28 ¼ −1.13ðMNa2 O Þ2 þ 28.1ðMNa2 O Þ − 130 ð1Þ
Table 2. Flow and Setting Time of Geopolymer Concrete
Mixes Flow (mm) Setting time (min) For 60°C for 24 h curing
S∶H 1-10M 580 50
S∶H 1-15M 560 36 0
S∶H 1-20M 470 28
fc28 ¼ −1.27ðMNa2 O Þ2 þ 31.2ðMNa2 O Þ − 140 ð2Þ
S∶H 2-10M 500 52
S∶H 2-15M 550 68 0
where f c28 = the 28-day compressive strength; and M Na2 O = mass
S∶H 2-20M 530 58
proportion of Na2 O to fly ash (%) of starting material.
S∶H 2-15M Room 2,403 22.99 (4.24) 39.02 (0.29) 3.02 (0.19) 3.47 (0.12) 26,800 (800) 10.39 (0.06)
Oven 2,412 38.85 (4.78) 48.18 (3.58) 3.59 (0.50) 4.03 (0.73) 31,000 (2200) 14.47 (0.44)
S∶H 2-20M Room 2,421 23.06 (0.63) 46.69 (1.17) 3.15 (0.04) 3.84 (0.24) 35,400 (2600) 8.80 (0.58)
Oven 2,409 39.27 (4.74) 49.50 (1.43) 3.92 (0.08) 3.99 (0.27) 31,800 (1200) 14.13 (1.16)
Note: Std. = standard deviation.
Fig. 1. Compressive strength of geopolymer concrete versus total Fig. 2. Splitting tensile strength of geopolymer concrete versus com-
content of Na2 O (%) pressive strength
Splitting Tensile Strength 363R-92 (ACI 1997) suggest Eqs. (5) and (6) for the calculation
of splitting tensile strengths of normal and high-strength concretes,
The results of splitting tensile strength are shown in Table 3. The
respectively
splitting tensile strength of HCGC at 7 and 28 days were 2.11–3.92
and 3.07–4.91 MPa. In general, the average splitting tensile fct ¼ 0.17ðf c0 Þ0.75 ð4Þ
strengths of concrete were affected by the concrete’s mix propor-
tions, a finding similar to that for compressive strength. It appears
that the splitting tensile strength at 7 days for the series with S∶H fct ¼ 0.56ðf c0 Þ0.5 ð5Þ
ratio of 1 was generally lower than that of the series with S∶H ratio
of 2. The strength continued to gain at the higher rate up to 28 days. fct ¼ 0.59ðf c0 Þ0.5 ð6Þ
This was true for both curing regimes.
Fig. 2 shows the plot of splitting tensile strength against the where f ct = splitting tensile strength (MPa); and f c0 = compressive
square root of compressive strength. The splitting tensile strength strength (MPa).
of concrete increased with increasing compressive strength. The These equations are plotted along with experimental data as
mean splitting tensile strengths in this experiment were between shown in Fig. 2. It can be seen that splitting tensile strengths of
6.9 and 13.7% of its mean compressive strength, which was similar HCGC in this study were generally higher than those reported by
to those of PC of 8–14% (Sagoe-Crenstil et al. 2001). A number of Sofi et al. (2007b) and those obtained from Eq. (5) for low-calcium
researchers described the relationship between the splitting tensile fly ash geopolymer concrete. This was due to strong interfacial
strength and compressive strength of concrete using Eq. (3) transition zone (ITZ) between geopolymer paste and aggregate re-
ported by several authors (Chen et al. 2013; Lee and van Deventer
fct ¼ kðfc0 Þn ð3Þ 2004; Ryu et al. 2013; Temuujin et al. 2010). Lee and van Deventer
(2004) reported that geopolymer produced with high hydroxide
where k and n are constants obtained from a regression analysis content and higher silicate solution tended to have higher ITZ
of experimental data. Ryu et al. (2013) suggested Eq. (4) for the strength due to lower porosity in geopolymer paste. In the geopol-
calculation of splitting tensile strength of low-calcium fly ash- ymer system with the presence of high calcium compound, it was
based geopolymer concrete. ACI 318-08 (ACI 2008) and ACI suggested that voids in aluminosilicate matrix were filled with
Acknowledgments
Fig. 5. Ultimate bond strength between rebar and geopolymer concrete
versus square root of compressive strength This work was financially supported by the Thailand Research
Fund (TRF) under the TRF Senior Research Scholar, Grant No.
RTA5480004. It was also supported by the Higher Education
Research Promotion and National Research University Project
strengths of the HCGC and reinforcing bar were significantly of Thailand, Office of the Higher Education Commission, through
higher than those found in Orangun et al. (1977), Esfahani and the Advanced Functional Materials Cluster of Khon Kaen Univer-
Rangan (1998), and Hadi (2008). In fact, Eq. (14) from this inves- sity AFM-2554-Ph.D. 54402.
tigation gave the bond strengths nearly double the values of those
obtained using Eq. (11) from Orangun et al. (1977). The high bond
strength was due to the relatively high splitting tensile strength as
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