Construction and Building Materials 24 (2010) 695–700

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Construction and Building Materials

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

Property evaluation of magnesium phosphate cement mortar

as patch repair material
Fei Qiao, C.K. Chau, Zongjin Li *
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The properties of magnesium phosphate cement (MPC) mortars with different magnesium to phosphate
Received 6 July 2009 (M/P) molar ratios and sand to binder (S/B) weight ratios have been investigated. The experimental
Received in revised form 2 September 2009 results show that both M/P and S/B ratios have large influence on the setting time and mechanical prop-
Accepted 26 October 2009
erties of MPC mortars. Therefore, the formulation has to be optimized in terms of the workability, perfor-
Available online 22 November 2009
mance, as well as cost consideration. Besides, the bond strength is an important performance index for a
patch repair material and hence received particular attention in this study. The test results demonstrate
Keywords:
that MPC mortars have superior bond strength to ordinary Portland cement (OPC) mortar/concrete sub-
Magnesium phosphate cement
Bond strength
strate. Finally, the volume stability measurements illustrate that the drying shrinkage of MPC based
Drying shrinkage repair mortars is much less than that of OPC mortar. It is demonstrated that MPC mortar is promising
Patch repair to be utilized in patch repair and maintenance works of concrete.
Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction MPC is traditionally prepared with ammonium phosphate [10–

With the consideration on aging problems of infrastructure and
other concrete structures in life-cycle design concept, planning for
maintenance and repair is becoming an increasingly important
part of the nowadays design procedures. Difficult decisions have
to be made in the selection of proper repair materials in structure
rehabilitation [1]. In some situations, requirement on minimum
down time for a repair, such as the heavy trafficked roads, dictates
the fast-setting, high early strength patching materials. Among
various rapid-hardening cements available for concrete repair,
magnesium phosphate based systems have been received more
and more attentions with increased applications [2–5].
Magnesium phosphate cement (MPC) is a new kind of binder
with chemical bonding formed by through-solution acid–base
reaction between dead burned magnesia and phosphate [6]. It
usually sets very fast and produces a high early strength, low
permeability patch with good durability [7–9]. Under ambient
temperature the patch for road repair could harden in 15 min
and open to traffic within a few hours [8]. Since the reaction pro-
cess of MPC formation is accompanied with strong heat release,
MPC based construction products are therefore promoted for appli-
cation in cold weather. In hot weather, the reaction heat and rate
can be, however, controlled by utilizing boron compounds, which
are setting retarders for the MPC system.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +852 23588751.
E-mail address: zongjin@ust.hk (Z. Li).
14] and magnesia with the downside of emitting ammonia during
processing and storage, which may lead to container corrosion and
create an unpleasant environmental odor [15,16]. In the recent
years, it is found that potassium dihydrogen phosphate (KDP) is
a good candidate for replacing ammonium phosphate. In addition,
KDP has a smaller dissociation constant and a lower molar solubil-
ity that help to reduce the reaction rate. Previous works [17,18] on
MPC paste prepared with KDP indicate that the properties of MPC
paste are mainly affected by the reactivity of magnesia, molar ratio
of magnesium to phosphate (M/P), as well as borax and water
content. Those findings reveal that MPC prepared with KDP also
exhibits fast-setting and healthy strength development. Besides
the mechanical properties, the bond to substrate concrete and
shrinkage behavior of the repair material are essential for applica-
tion in structure rehabilitation [1]. However, little work has been
reported on these issues.
This current work is firstly dedicated to the influences of M/P
molar ratio and sand to binder (S/B) weight ratio on the setting
and mechanical properties of MPC mortar, and then to the bond
strength and volume stability. It is understood that the bond
strength is greatly dependent on the test mechanism [19], there-
fore, pull-off and flexural test, are employed to measure the bond
strength between MPC and OPC concrete substrate, which taking
two different stress states into account. Pull-off test measures
the bond strength under direct tension while flexural test is an
indirect tension test in which the sample is subjected to combined
bending and shear stresses. The corresponding results obtained

0950-0618/$ - see front matter Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2009.10.039
696 F. Qiao et al. / Construction and Building Materials 24 (2010) 695–700

from the two methods are compared for a better evaluation of the In this study, two kinds of tests were employed to evaluate the bond strength
between the MPC repair mortar and the substrate OPC mortar or concrete. One
MPC mortar. Finally the volume stability of MPC mortar is moni-
was defined as flexural bond strength, which was a kind of indirect bond test and
tored and compared to that of other patch repair materials. conducted by four-point bending as shown in Fig. 1a. The specimen for flexural
bond test was a beam made by half of OPC and half of MPC mortar. The OPC mortar
was prepared by ordinary Portland cement with water to cement ratio of 0.45 and
2. Experimental programme
S/B ratio of 2.0. After curing for 28 days, the MPC mortar was placed besides the half
beam of OPC mortar with roughed surface. The compressive and flexural strength of
2.1. Raw materials and mix proportion
OPC mortar at 28 days were 45 MPa and 5.7 MPa, respectively. The other bond test
defined as tensile bond strength was carried out by pull-off method according to BS
Dead burned magnesia powder was obtained from Jinan, Shandong province,
1881-207:1992. The test setup is shown in Fig. 1b. The mix proportion of the sub-
China and fly ash (FA) from China Light Power (CLP), Hong Kong. In addition, chem-
strate concrete was based on a 28-days compressive strength of 40 MPa, consisting
ical grade potassium dihydrogen phosphate (KH2PO4 or KDP) and borax (Na2-
of cement, water, sand, and crushed aggregate by 1:0.5:1.5:2.5 (by weight). The cast
B4O710H2O) were adopted in this study. The chemical composition of the raw
substrate slabs were kept in laboratory condition for at least 28 days before the re-
materials was characterized by X-ray fluorescence spectrometer (XRF, JEOL JSX-
pair material was placed. Before casting MPC mortar over surface of substrate, the
3201Z) and the particle size distribution was determined by laser particle size ana-
surfaces were roughened using a steel wire brush to remove the top cement paste
lyzer (Coulter LS230). The phase analysis was carried out by a PANalytical X’pert
layer. The estimated amplitude of roughness was 3–4 mm. For measurement of
PRO-MPD diffractometer using Cu-Ka (wavelength = 1.54056 Å, 40 mA, 40 kV) radi-
pull-off strength, disk specimens of 75 mm diameter and 15 mm height were cast
ation as the source with a step size of 0.05°. The morphology of magnesia and fly
on the roughed surface of OPC concrete and the test was performed with pull-off
ash particles was observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM, JSM-6300F).
tester (Dyna Z16SE). The bond strength was calculated by dividing the maximum
MPC mortar was prepared by mixing magnesia, FA, soluble KDP, borax, sand,
force by the bond area.
and potable water according to the designed formulae as shown in Table 1. M/P
Drying shrinkage of mortar was measured from samples with a size of
means the molar ratio of magnesium to KDP and borax was weighed by mass per-
25  25  285 mm3. After demoulding, the specimens were stored in a curing room
centage of the magnesia. The water requirement of the mortar was found to be
at a temperature of 27 ± 1 °C and a relative humidity of 50 ± 5%. The initial length
greatly affected by S/B ratio, so the water to power (including magnesia, FA, KDP,
was recorded at 24-h after the casting of the specimens.
and borax) ratio was adjusted to make sure the workability of all of the specimens
was around the same level. In all of the MPC formulae, 20 wt.% of magnesia was re-
placed by fly ash to reduce the cost and adjust the color of MPC material similar to
ordinary Portland cement material.
3. Results and discussion

The chemical compositions of magnesia and fly ash are listed in

2.2. Property measurement
Table 2 which belongs to class F according to ASTM C618-94a. The
For each mixture, setting time was determined by using modified Vicat needle particle size distribution and morphology of magnesia and fly ash
according to ASTM standard C807-05. Fresh mortar was well mixed and prism spec- are shown in Figs. 2 and 3, respectively. Scanning electron micros-
imens of 40  40  160 mm3 were cast for strength measurement. The specimens copy reveals that the fly ash sample consists of hollowed spherical
were demoulded and then cured in lab at a temperature of 20 ± 1 °C and a relative
particles with size varying from 1 to 10 lm while dead burned
humidity of 50 ± 5%. Compressive strength was carried out at 1, 3, 7 and 28 days by
an automatic concrete compression machine (ADS2000, unit test) with a loading magnesia particle exhibits a coarser and irregular shape.
rate of 3 kN per second. Flexural strength was determined by a MTS machine
(810 mechanics test system, 250 kN) according to ASTM standard C348-02.
3.1. Setting time, compressive strength, and flexural strength

Table 1 The setting time of various MPC mortars are summarized in Ta-
Mixture proportion and setting time of MPC mortars. ble 1. The setting time of MPC mortar is quite short and usually set
in less than 15 min. When magnesia and phosphate powder are
M/Pa Boraxb S/Bc W/Bd Setting (min)
mixed with water, phosphate is dissolved instantaneously to form
6 7.5 1.5 0.20 11.25 an acidic aqueous medium followed by the dissolution of basic
8 7.5 1 0.16 11
8 7.5 1.5 0.20 8
magnesia through releasing magnesium ions into the solution,
8 7.5 2 0.23 6.5 then strong chemical reactions take place and the crystalline prod-
10 7.5 1.5 0.20 7.25 ucts (MgKPO46H2O, MKP) are formed [17,18]. It is also found that
12 7.5 1.5 0.20 7 the setting time was shortened with both M/P and S/B ratios. This
a
Magnesium to phosphate molar ratio. is because increasing the amount of the magnesia would raise the
b
Weight ratio to magnesia. pH of the reaction environment and then accelerated the reaction
c
Sand to binder weight ratio, binder includes magnesia, fly ash, phosphate, and between MgO and phosphate [19].
borax.
d The effect of S/B ratio on the workability of MPC fresh mortar
Water to binder weight ratio.
was well observed during the casting. Too much sand tended to

P/2 P/2
50
Dolly
MPC φ75×20
40 OPC MPC

140 Roughened surface

160 Concrete substrate

(a) (b)
Fig. 1. Experimental setups of: (a) flexural bond strength and (b) tensile bond strength (the unit is mm).
 F. Qiao et al. / Construction and Building Materials 24 (2010) 695–700 697

Table 2 50
Chemical composition of magnesia and fly ash. Sand ratio 1.0
Raw material Mass fraction of the sample (%) Sand ratio 1.5
40

Compressive strength, MPa

MgO Al2O3 SiO2 CaO MnO Fe2O3 SO3 LOI Sand ratio 2.0

Magnesia 84.0 2.30 9.36 2.67 0.13 1.60 – –

Fly ash 3.59 24.91 49.57 8.25 – 7.76 2.10 3.82 30

20
6
Fly ash
10
Magnesia
Differential volume (%)

0
4
1 3 7 28
Curing time (days)

Fig. 4. Effect of sand ratio on the compressive strength of MPC mortar.

2
0 tio. For all of the mixtures, the 1-day strengths are nearly the same
0.1 1 10
Particle size (μm)
Fig. 2. Particle size distribution of magnesia and fly ash.
produce a harsh mixture with low consistency and finishability
causing difficulties to place and compact. While mixtures contain-
ing a very low proportion of sand showed excellent cohesiveness
but tended to be sticky. Unfortunately, there was no standard test
which could measure the workability directly as defined before. In
this study, the mortar with moderate S/B ratio of 1.5 provided good
workability and suitable cohesiveness.
The influence of S/B ratio on the compressive strength of MPC
mortar is shown in Fig. 4. At the fixed M/P ratio of 8, the strengths
of MPC with S/B ratio of 1.0 and 1.5 are very close and both of them
are obviously higher than that with S/B ratio of 2.0 before 7 days.
At 28 days, the strength of specimen with S/B ratio of 1.0 is 6%
and 24% higher than that with S/B ratio of 1.5 and 2.0, respectively.
With the similar performance, higher sand ratio means lower cost
and thus S/B ratio of 1.5 has the highest performance/cost ratio in
this study.
At the given S/B ratio of 1.5, the influence of M/P ratio on the
compressive strength is shown in Fig. 5. It can be seen that the
early strength of MPC mortar does not change much with M/P ra-
100 at around 20 MPa except the mixtures with M/P ratio of 6 with a
slight lower early strength. With time development, the mixtures
with M/P of 8 and 10 have higher strength increment ratio and
the former obtains the highest ultimate strength. Similar patterns
are also found in the flexural strengths of the MPC mortars as
shown in Fig. 6. From literature [20], an early (1-day) compressive
strength of the repair material of 20 MPa can be considered strong
enough for opening the repaired section to traffic. Therefore, in
terms of compressive strength, MPC based mortars with a M/P mo-
lar ratio around 8–10 would be suitable for repair and maintenance
works.
According to the main reaction equation of MPC as shown be-
low in Eq. (1), the theoretical molar ratio of MgO and KDP for com-
plete MgO consumption is 1, but it is notable that an excess of
magnesium is always required in a mix as mentioned before to
guarantee the strength development because only the outer rim
of magnesia can react with KDP in a very short time and the
unreacted magnesia can be regarded as a hard core bonded by
hydration products and contributed to the increase of strength
[21]. Increasing the M/P ratio will increase unreacted magnesia
cores and thus the strength development. But too much magnesia

Fig. 3. Morphology of raw particles of: (a) magnesia and (b) fly ash.
698 F. Qiao et al. / Construction and Building Materials 24 (2010) 695–700

MKP SiO2 MgO

40
(d)
Compressive strength, MPa

30

Peak intensity (counts)

(c)
M/P 06
20
M/P 08
M/P 10
M/P 12 (b)
10
0 7 14 21 28
Curing time (days)

Fig. 5. Effect of M/P ratio on the compressive strength of MPC mortar.

(a)

5.5
15 25 35 45 55
2-theta (degree)

4.5 Fig. 7. X-ray diffractograms of the repair mortars (sand ratio of 1.5) with different
Flexural strength, MPa

molar ratios: (a) M/P = 6; (b) M/P = 8; (c) M/P = 10 and (d) M/P = 12.

3.5

M/P 06
2.5 M/P 08
M/P 10
M/P 12
1.5
0 7 14 21 28
Curing time (days)

Fig. 6. Effect of M/P ratio on the flexural strength of MPC mortar.

content may lead less binding thus adversely affect the strength.
Therefore, for MPC mortar, both M/P ratio and S/B ratio shall be
optimized such that the mixture has suitable ratio between ‘‘hard
cores” and ‘‘binders” to get the highest strength. The X-ray diffrac-
tograms of the repair mortars (with S/B ratio of 1.5) with different
M/P ratios (from 6 to 12) are shown in Fig. 7. It shows that with the
increase of M/P ratio, the unreacted magnesia is more as expected.
Besides, the amount of the reaction product, MgKPO46H2O (MKP),
of the mortar with an M/P ratio of 8 is the most among the differ-
ent samples. That may be the reason of why the mortar with an M/
P ratio of 8 has the highest strength as demonstrated above. The
typical morphology of the reaction products of magnesium phos-
phate cement is revealed in Fig. 8. The representative microstruc-
ture of MKP polycrystals is in the rod-like form.
MgO þ KH2 PO4 þ 5H2 O ! MgKPO4  6H2 O
From the experiment results, it can be concluded that M/P of 8
and S/B ratio of 1.5 offer a good formulation in terms of mechanical
property, workability, and cost. In the later experiments, S/B ratio
of 1.5 is adopted and only the influence of M/P ratio on the prop-
erties is discussed.
3.2. Flexural bond strength
The performance of any concrete repair is highly dependent on
the quality of bond between the repair material to the substrate
concrete. This is particularly true for repairs which are not an-
Fig. 8. Microstructure of the reaction products of MPC paste.
chored or tied back by encapsulating existing or new reinforcing
steel or anchors, thus rely totally on the durability of bond to the
substrate concrete for long term success of the repair. The results
of the flexural bond strength test are shown in Fig. 9. The results
indicate that the bond strength of MPC with OPC mortar is not sen-
ð1Þ sitive to M/P ratio at early stage but at late stage the lower M/P ra-
tio leads to a higher bond strength. Compared with the OPC
repaired specimen, MPC shows prominent bond strength which
is 77–120% higher than that of OPC mortar at 28 days.
The failure modes are characterized by the location of the fail-
ure in the specimens, which can be used to judge the quality of
the bond. For the failures occur in OPC mortar or in MPC mortar,
the actual bond strength between the two kinds of mortar should
be higher than the flexural strength of either material. When the
bonding between repair material and old OPC mortar presents
the weakest link, failure will occur right at the interface surface.
As for the failure pattern of specimens, it is found that the MPC
repaired samples always break in MPC mortar before 7 days and
 F. Qiao et al. / Construction and Building Materials 24 (2010) 695–700 699

5.5 off strength may not be improved at further lower M/P levels.
But if the M/P ratio is further decreased the cost of the repair mate-
rial would be increased much due to higher cost of KDP. Therefore,
M/P of 8 is regarded as a good compromise in terms of cost and
Flexural bond strength, MPa

4.5
3.5
2.5
1.5
0 7
Curing time (days)
Fig. 9. Effect of M/P ratio on the flexural bond strength of MPC mortar.
fail in OPC mortar at 28 days while the OPC repaired specimens fail
at the interface all the time. The results combined with the flexural
strength of OPC at 28 days and MPC (in Fig. 6) demonstrate that at
early stage, since the MPC repair mortar has not been matured
completely, the flexural strength decreases in the order: OPC mor-
tar > bond > MPC. While at 28 days, the flexural strength of MPC is
maturely developed and over than that of OPC, the flexural
strength decreases in the order: MPC mortar > bond > OPC. The
bond failure of OPC repaired specimen indicates the OPC mortar
has poor bonding with itself.
3.3. Tensile bond strength
behavior.
For the pull-off test, the failure of the specimen mainly occurs
at: (a) the substrate concrete; (b) the interface between repair
M/P 06 M/P 08 material and substrate concrete; or (c) the dolly-adhesive inter-
M/P 10 M/P 12 face. The last case could be eliminated by consistent workmanship
and proper preparation including degreasing, abrasion and clean-
OPC
ing of the mortar surface before attaching the dolly. The tests for
the specimens with higher bond strength such as M/P of 6 and 8
usually fail with the first mode while others fail with the second
mode.
14 21 28 It is well accepted that the adhesion of the repair material to the
old OPC interface is dependent on material compaction, moisture
content of repair surface and roughness of interface. It is believed
there should exist some chemical interlock between MPC and
OPC substrate that improve the bond performance of MPC. For a
small M/P ratio, the more hydrates is available to lubricate the
mortar. At the same roughness of interface, the specimen with
the better fluidity and sufficient paste to wet the interface would
achieve the better adhesion to substrate. This is why the specimen
with lower M/P has higher bond strength in both the flexural and
pull-off test.
Both test methods have disadvantages but the trends are con-
sistent. Performing a good pull-off test is difficult and time con-
suming while flexural test offers low efficiency because the area
of the bonded surface subjected to loading is small compared to
the specimen volume. Therefore, it is recommended to select the
test method that may represent the state of stress close to the field
application.

Pull-off test is a kind of direct tension test in which the tensile

3.4. Volume stability
force is transmitted to the repair material by the glued dolly. A very
careful alignment of the specimen in the axis of loading is therefore
Drying shrinkage of repair material is another major concern of
essential [19]. Even a very small amount of misalignment may
concrete repair because the success of any patch repair depends
introduce eccentricities that will cause large scatter in test results.
largely on overcoming the tendency of the patching material to
With each formula, a group of six specimens are tested and the
shrink after placement. The shrinkage test results of MPC mortar
mean values of them are given in Fig. 10. It can be seen that
and reference OPC mortar are shown in Fig. 11. All results are aver-
pull-off test provides more conservative value than flexural test
aged values of three specimens. It can be seen that all of the MPC
but the trends are in agreement well with each other. Similar with
mortars have less shrinkage than OPC mortar at all ages. The
the results in flexural test, all of MPC repaired samples have obvi-
shrinkage of OPC increases significantly in the 1st week reaching
ously higher bond strength than OPC repaired specimen. From
700 microstrain at the age of 7 days, while the shrinkage of MPC
Fig. 10, the tensile bond strength is decreased with M/P ratio. Since
mortars is only around 40% of OPC mortar at the same age. At early
the bond strengths at M/P of 6 and 8 are very close and notably
stage the influence of M/P ratio on the shrinkage of MPC mortar is
higher than that at M/P of 10 and 12, it is believed that the pull-

1.5 1000

800
Drying shrinkage (microstrain)
Tensile bond strength, MPa

1 600

400

0.5 200 M_06 S_1.5 M_08 S_1.0

M_08 S_1.5 M_08 S_2.0
M/P 06 M/P 08
0 M_10 S_1.5 M_12 S_1.5
M/P 10 M/P 12
OPC OPC S_2.0
0 -200
0 7 14 21 28 0 7 14 21 28
Curing time (days) Time (day)

Fig. 10. Effect of M/P ratio on the tensile bond strength of MPC mortar. Fig. 11. Drying shrinkage of MPC mortars and OPC mortar.
700 F. Qiao et al. / Construction and Building Materials 24 (2010) 695–700
Table 3
Properties of the individual component of the MPC system.
MgO + KH2PO4 + 5H2O ? KMgPO46H2O
Molar mass (g/mol) 40 136 18 266
Density (g/cm3) 3.77 2.338 1 1.711
Volume occupied (cm3/mol) 10.61 58.17 90 155.46
obvious. With the increase of the M/P ratio, the shrinkage is de-
creased. With the time development, shrinkages tend to be stable
and very close for all mixtures except that with M/P ratio of 6
has a little higher value at around 650 microstrain. It is estimated
that the early shrinkage is mainly due to the chemical reaction and
at the late stage due to the evaporation or migration of free water.
From the theoretical volumes of individual ingredient as well as
the volume of the reaction product in MPC system given in Table
3, the volume change after reaction can be calculated with Eq. (2):
155:46  10:61  58:17  90
Estimated volume change ¼
10:61 þ 58:17 þ 90
 100% ¼ 2:09%
It can be seen from the calculation that the formation of MKP is
accompanied by slight volume shrinkage. Because all of the mix-
tures have M/P ratio higher than the theoretical value of 1, with
the fixed total weight, lowering of the M/P ratio leads to produce
more reaction products and cause larger volume shrinkage. From
Fig. 11, we can also find the great effect of S/B ratio on the shrink-
age of MPC. Regardless the M/P ratio, the lower the S/B ratio, the
larger the shrinkage. Involving sand into the paste can restrict
the shrinkage of the specimen.
4. Conclusions
With different M/P and S/B ratios, the mechanical properties
and performance in patch repair of magnesium phosphate cement
mortar including setting time, compressive strength, flexural
strength, bond strength, and volume stability are systematically
studied. Based on the experimental results obtained in the current
study, the following general conclusions can be drawn:
(1) The setting behavior and mechanical properties of MPC mor-
tars are highly dependent on their corresponding M/P ratio.
The results of evaluation show that the setting time of MPC
mortars is usually less than 15 min and further decreased
with raised M/P and S/B ratios. As the M/P ratio increases,
the strength of MPC mortar increases at first and then
decreases when M/P ratio is larger than 8. Understandably
the specimen with higher M/P ratio has higher early strength
but lower strength increment in the later stage.
(2) In addition, the influence of S/B ratio on the strength devel-
opment is accompanied with its adverse effect on the work-
ability of MPC mortar. At lower S/B ratio, the mortar tends to
be rather sticky. Moreover, high strength is associated with
high cost. Too much sand may produce a harsh mixture with
low finishability and consistency leading to lowered
strength and bonding. It is found that an M/P ratio of 8
and a S/B ratio of 1.5 can be regarded as optimum for MPC
mortar formulation for patch repair in terms of mechanical
strength, workability, as well as cost consideration.
(3) To measure the bond strength of MPC mortar to OPC mortar
substrate, two kinds of bond tests have been carried out.
They are flexural bending test and pull-off tensile test repre-
senting two different states of stress subjected by the repair
mortar. The experimental results demonstrate that MPC
mortars have distinctly higher bond strength than OPC mor-
tar, with a 77–120% enhancement in flexural bond strength
and a 85–180% increment in tensile bond strength. Generally
speaking, the lower the M/P ratio, the higher is the bond
strength.
(4) MPC mortars exhibit much better volume stability than OPC
mortar and their shrinkage is mainly affected by S/B ratio.
The higher the S/B ratio, the lower is the shrinkage. The
shrinkage of MPC mortars at 28 days is around 20–50% less
than that of OPC mortar.
(5) From the excellent performance of MPC mortars in this eval-
uation, it is believed that MPC based mortar is a promising
alternative to the currently available market products to be
utilized as a patch repair material, especially for those main-
tenance works with limited time before open to use.
Acknowledgements
The financial supports from Hong Kong Research Grant Council
ð2Þ under the Grant of 616008 and China Ministry of Science and
Technology under the Grant of 2009CB32000 are gratefully
acknowledged.
References
[1] Morgan DR. Compatibility of concrete repair materials and systems. Constr
Build Mater 1996;10(1):57–67.
[2] Péra J, Ambroise J. Fiber-reinforced magnesia–phosphate cement composites
for rapid repair. Cem Concr Compos 1998;20(1):31–9.
[3] Ding Z, Li Z. High-early-strength magnesium phosphate cement with fly ash.
ACI Mater J 2005;102(6):375–81.
[4] Soudée E, Péra J. Mechanism of setting reaction in magnesia–phosphate
cements. Cem Concr Res 2000;30(2):315–21.
[5] Iyengar SR, Al-Tabbaa A. Developmental study of a low-pH magnesium
phosphate cement for environmental applications. Environ Technol
2007;28(12):1387–401.
[6] Abdelrazig BEI, Sharp JH, EI-Jazairi B. The chemical composition of mortars
made from magnesia–phosphate cement. Cem Concr Res 1998;18(3):415–25.
[7] Yang Q, Zhang S, Wu X. Deicer-scaling resistance of phosphate cement-based
binder for rapid repair of concrete. Cem Concr Res 2002;32(1):165–8.
[8] Seehra SS, Gupta S, Kumar S. Rapid setting magnesium phosphate cement for
quick repair of concrete pavements – characterisation and durability aspects.
Cem Concr Res 1993;23(2):254–66.
[9] Yang Q, Zhu B, Wu X. Characteristics and durability test of magnesium
phosphate cement-based material for rapid repair of concrete. Mater Struct
2000;33(228):229–34.
[10] Sugama T, Kukacka LE. Magnesium monophosphate cements derived from
diammonium phosphate solutions. Cem Concr Res 1983;13(3):407–16.
[11] Abdelrazig BEI, Sharp JH, EI-Jazairi B. The microstructure and mechanical
properties of mortars made from magnesia–phosphate cement. Cem Concr Res
1989;19(2):247–58.
[12] Sarkar AK. Hydration/dehydration characteristics of struvite and dittmarite
pertaining to magnesium ammonium phosphate cement system. J Mater Sci
1991;26(9):2514–8.
[13] Jiang HY, Zhang LM. Investigation of phosphate cement-based binder with
super high early strength for repair of concrete. J Wuhan Univ Technol, Mater
Sci Ed 2001;16(3):46–8.
[14] Paceagiu J, Georgescu M. The influence of curing conditions on the physical
and mechanical properties of magnesia phosphate cements. Revista de Chimie
2008;59(2):135–9.
[15] Wagh AS. Chemically bonded phosphate ceramics: 21st century materials
with diverse applications. Amsterdam: Elsevier; 2004.
[16] Ding Z, Li Z. Effect of aggregates and water contents on the properties of
magnesium phospho-silicate cement. Cem Concr Compos 2005;27(1):11–8.
[17] Qiao F, Lin W, Chau CK, Li Z. Property assessment of magnesium phosphate
cement. Key Eng Mater 2009;400–402:115–20.
[18] Qiao F, Chau CK, Li Z. Setting and compressive strength characteristics of
magnesium phosphate cement paste. Adv Cem Res 2009.
[19] Momayez A, Ehsani MR, Ramezanianpour AA, Rajaie H. Comparison of
methods for evaluating bond strength between concrete substrate and repair
materials. Cem Concr Res 2005;35(4):748–57.
[20] Crovetti J. Early opening of Portland cement concrete pavements to traffic.
Report submitted to Wisconsin department of transportation; 2005.
[21] Stratful I, Scrimshaw MD, Lester JN. Conditions influencing the precipitation of
magnesium ammonium phosphate. Water Res 2001;35(17):4191–9.