Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902

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Construction and Building Materials

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Fabrication of a non-cement binder using slag, palm oil fuel ash and rice
husk ash with sodium hydroxide
M.R. Karim a,⇑, M.F.M. Zain a,⇑, M. Jamil a, F.C. Lai b
a
Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, University Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Malaysia
b
Regional Technology Support Centre, Sika Kimia Sdn Bhd, Malaysia

h i g h l i g h t s

 A new non-cement binder (NCB) is developed as a supplement of cement.

 NCB is fabricated using slag, POFA and RHA with NaOH at ambient temperature.
 Four different mix ratios of slag, POFA and RHA were designed to fabricate the NCB.
 NaOH is the key element that contributes as a binding agent in developing NCB.
 NCB could be used as a sustainable binder (alternative of cement) in the near future.

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

Article history: The aim of the study is to fabricate a new non-cement binder (NCB) using slag, palm oil fuel ash (POFA)
Received 30 April 2013 and rice husk ash (RHA). To activate these materials, sodium hydroxide (NaOH) was used at 2.5%, 5.0%
Received in revised form 18 August 2013 and 7.5% by weight of NCB. Four different mix ratios of the slag, POFA and RHA were designed to fabricate
Accepted 29 August 2013
the NCB. Mortar-prisms of NCB were cast using water-to-binder ratio of 0.5 and 0.6 with required superp-
Available online 1 October 2013
lasticizer. Mortar specimens were immersed in a water bath at 25 ± 2 °C for curing. NCB was tested for its
consistency, setting time, flow, flexural and compressive strengths. XRD, SEM and FTIR analyses of NCB-
Keywords:
mortars were also obtained. The results revealed that the consistency, setting time, flow and strength of
Pozzolanic materials (slag, palm oil fuel ash,
rice husk ash)
NCB-paste/mortars are greatly influenced by the mix proportion and fineness of constituent materials of
Non-cement binder NCB, and NaOH doses. NCB-mortar containing 42% slag, 28% POFA and 30% RHA with 5% NaOH achieves
Chemical activator (NaOH) the highest compressive strength of 40.68 MPa and a flexural strength of 6.57 MPa at 28 days. From the
FTIR analysis, NCB-mortars are observed to have silica–hydrate bond with sodium or other inorganic
metals (i.e., sodium–silica–hydrate–alumina gel). Therefore, NCB could be fabricated from the aforemen-
tioned materials.
Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The use of cement and concrete is essential for the rapid urban-
ization all around the world. Nowadays, conventional ordinary
Portland cement (OPC)-based concrete is one of the most versatile
and extensively used man-made construction materials world-
wide. It is considered as a key element in social, economic, and
infrastructural development because cement and concrete are vital
construction materials in building many infrastructures such as
buildings, roads, culverts, bridges, flyovers, tunnels, river protec-
tion structures, railways, and so on. Thus, 25 billion tons of con-
crete are produced yearly all over the world. The global cement
consumption increased to 2.9 billion tons annually, and is pre-
⇑ Corresponding authors. Tel.: +60 166142912, +60 133304484, +880 1711005462.
E-mail address: reza_civil128@yahoo.com (M.R. Karim).
dicted to increase to 4 billion tons in 2020 [1] because thus far,
no recognized and/or alternative technology is available to produce
concrete except cement. In fact, OPC is not only an energy-inten-
sive material but also emits 7% CO2, a greenhouse gas, to the atmo-
sphere. Thus, OPC contributes to climate change, which is a
pressing global issue faced by current and future generations [2].
Thus, alternative ways to solve/minimize all of the abovemen-
tioned problems and to promote sustainable construction are the
prime research interest in the cement and concrete technology in
the past decade. The use of pozzolanic materials, either natural
or by-products, in the production of composite cements has gained
increasing interest because of ecological, economical, and diversi-
fied product quality reasons [3].
Huge quantities of pozzolanic wastes are produced daily world-
wide. Despite their technical and financial benefits, all of these
wastes are usually disposed into the environment without any

0950-0618/$ - see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2013.08.077
 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902 895

salvage value. For instance, approximately 100 million tons of slags
(an industrial by-product from steel industries) are produced
annually worldwide. However, only a small amount of slag is used
and the rest is disposed [2]. The palm oil fuel ash (POFA) is pro-
duced by palm oil industries. The rice husk ash (RHA) is a waste
that is generated from rice processing mills. POFA and RHA are pro-
duced in large quantities as pozzolanic wastes mainly from devel-
oping countries. For instance, Malaysia is one of the largest
producers of POFA. A thousand tons of POFA are produced annually
by the 200 palm oil mills that are operating in Malaysia, and they
are simply dumped into ponds/lagoons without any profitable va-
lue [4]. Moreover, approximately 110 million tons [5] of rice husk
(approximately 20% of 550 million tons of rice) and 16–22 million
tons of RHA are generated worldwide. No potential/alternative
uses have been developed particularly for POFA and RHA, and huge
costs are spent for transportation and removal reasons. Further-
more, enormous environmental pollutions were also noted. All of
these pozzolanic waste materials are reported to contain a high
percentage of silicon dioxide or alumino silica in amorphous form.
Accordingly, many researchers have suggested the use of these as
pozzolans and/or as a cement substitute and as an ingredient of
concrete because of their technical, financial, and environmental
importance. For example, quaternary-blended cement (produced
from slag, POFA, RHA, and timber ash by 66% OPC replacement)
was used to produce a high strength (100–120 MPa), sustainable,
and high-performance concrete [6]. Moreover, slag [7], POFA and
RHA [8] can improve the engineering and durability properties of
concrete. Thus, the utilization of the mentioned pozzolans as a sub-
stitute of cement in concrete construction would be a valuable and
appropriate step in solving/minimizing problems such as CO2
emission, sustainable concrete production, pollution control, lack
of demand of cementitious materials, and increasing cement
consumption.
In the past, most studies used pozzolans as a partial replace-
ment of cement [7–12]. Previously, cement was replaced by vari-
ous pozzolans with a certain amount, based on single [7–9] or
binary replacement [10,11]. Besides, some attempts were taken
to use these pozzolans as ternary [11,12] blend with cement. None
of those studies used pozzolanic materials as full (100%) replace-
ment of cement in ordinary concrete/mortar. In addition, a number
of studies were performed on geopolymer concrete production
2.2. Testing of materials properties
Fineness and grain size of materials were determined using automatic Blaine
machine and Malvern Mastersizer, respectively. The amorphous or crystal phase
of materials was examined by X-Ray diffractometer (XRD) analysis. Chemical com-
position of materials was determined using X-ray fluorescence (XRF) test. The mor-
phological view and shape of the particles of materials were examined using
scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis.
2.3. Design of mix proportions for NCB
To fabricate the NCB, four different mix proportions of slag, RHA and POFA were
designed as presented in Table 1. For this, maximum range of utilization of slag
[7,21], POFA [8,12] and RHA [9,22] (as partial replacement of OPC) was chosen
based on the recommendations from past researches. Depending on these sugges-
tions, the percentage/content of RHA was fixed, firstly. The rest percentage was dis-
tributed for slag and POFA as 3:2 ratios. For instance NCB2, RHA content was
selected as 10% initially. For the rest 90%, amount of slag and POFA was calculated
as 54% and 36%, respectively (i.e., slag: POFA = 3:2). Proportions of slag, POFA and
RHA were determined by same calculation for all of the other NCB mixes. These
mixes were used in two phases of materials, namely, (a) without grinding of RHA
and POFA, which was indicated as ‘‘UG’’, and (b) after grinding of RHA and POFA,
which was designated as ‘‘G’’. The fineness of NCB was significantly enhanced by
grinding POFA and RHA in a ballmill machine maintaining the final Blaine number
of over 4500 cm2/g. The slag was used as received from the industry.
2.4. Preparation of paste and mortar prism
At the beginning of the research, NaOH was utilized at 2.5%, 5.0% and 7.5% by
weight of NCB as some trials using NCB4 (G) mortar specimen. Depending on the
best strength development of mortar from these trials, NaOH was used at 5% by
weight of NCB for all of the other NCB-mortars and pastes. To prepare the mortars,
water-to-binder ratio (W/B) was kept as 0.5 for all samples, while, W/B ratio was
taken as 0.6 for ungrounded samples of NCB3 and NCB4. The ungrounded samples
of NCB3 and NCB4 needed more water to produce a mortar with a reasonable flow.
The sand-to-binder (S/B) ratio was taken as 3.0 according to BS/EN 196-1 [20].
Materials were mixed to prepare the paste and mortar using a Hobart mixing ma-
chine according to ASTM C305 specification [23], but with a slight modification
such that before pouring the binder into the water, the chemical activator was
poured into the water and stirred for 60 ± 10 s to dilate the NaOH flakes. Mortar-
prisms (40 mm  40 mm  160 mm in size) were compacted using a mechanical
vibrator table. Moulds of the NCB mortars were removed after two days because
the specimens could collapse if immersed in the water for less than two days.
The specimens were then immersed in a curing tank at a temperature of 25 ± 2 °C
for a desired testing age of 3, 7, 14 and 28 days.

[13–18], a kind of concrete that is produced from aggregates with

fly ash/slag that are activated using highly concentrated (molarity
about 6–16 M) alkaline activators and sodium/potassium silicate.
The curing of geopolymer concrete is usually performed at approx-
imately 60 °C to 90 °C. Therefore, this paper presents an experi-
mental investigation on the fabrication of a non-cement binder
(NCB) as a substitute/alternative of cement using slag, POFA and
RHA with lower amount of sodium hydroxide (mainly 5% weight
of binder, equivalent to 62.5 M) at ambient temperature curing
regime.
2.5. Testing of paste and mortar prism
The consistency and setting time of the pastes were determined according to
ASTM C187 [24] and ASTM C191 [25] by using a Vicat apparatus, respectively.
The mortar flow spread test was performed using a flow table based on the ASTM
C1437 testing procedure [26]. The flexural and compressive strength of mortar-
prism was determined using a universal testing machine according to the BS/EN
196-1 test standard [20]. XRD patterns and SEM images of mortars were also deter-
mined. The types of chemical bonding characteristics of mortars were identified by
Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) analysis.

2. Materials and methods Table 1

Mix proportions of materials for the preparation of mortars (% by weight).
2.1. Materials Binders Raw materials (%) SP (%) NaOH (%) W/B S/B

Ground granulated blast furnace slag, RHA and POFA were used as binder in this Slag POFA RHA OPC
research. To activate these materials, NaOH flakes of analytical grade were obtained NCB1 (UG) 60 40 0 0 1.0 5.0 0.5 3.0
from Merck. The slag was provided by Slag Cement Sdn Bhd, Malaysia. POFA was NCB1 (G) 60 40 0 0 0.0 5.0 0.5
received from Ulu Langat palm oil mill, Selangor, Malaysia. RHA was produced at NCB2 (UG) 54 36 10 0 2.5 5.0 0.5
the concrete and structure laboratory in University Kebangsaan Malaysia by using NCB2 (G) 54 36 10 0 0.0 5.0 0.5
a special type of furnace that was reported by Zain et al. [19]. OPC (42.5 N) was used NCB3 (UG) 48 32 20 0 3.5 5.0 0.6
to compare different fresh and hardened properties of the new binder. Standard NCB3 (G) 48 32 20 0 2.0 5.0 0.5
sand, as required by BS/EN 196-1 testing procedure [20], was used as fine aggregate. NCB4 (UG) 42 28 30 0 4.5 5.0 0.6
Superplasticizer (SP), Darex Super 20 as obtained from Grace, was used to increase NCB4 (G) 42 28 30 0 3.5 5.0 0.5
and maintain sufficient flow for casting. Available drinking water was used for mor- OPC 0 0 0 100 0.0 0.0 0.5
tar casting and curing purposes.
896 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902

3. Results and discussion
3.1. Characteristics of raw materials and NCBs
3.1.1. Chemical and physical properties of materials
The chemical and physical properties of the materials are pre-
sented in Table 2. Among all materials, RHA contains a higher
amount of silica (87.75%). The loss of ignition (LOI) is higher for
POFA but is less than 10% according to ASTM C618 [27]. The SO3
content of this material is more than 4% based on the same stan-
dard, whereas the SO3 content is approximately 4% for NCB. LOI
is within the limit for all NCB samples. POFA contains 11.86% of
K2O, which is greater compared with other materials, because
these trees consume K2O from the soil during the cultivation per-
iod. NCB has almost double quantity of silica and alumina content
and one-half to one-third amount of CaO content compared to OPC.
The sum of major oxides (SiO2 + Al2O3 + Fe2O3) of NCB is over 50%,
which is greater than 50% (minimum) according to ASTM C618 for
class C pozzolan [27].
3.1.2. Fineness of materials
The particle sizes of the raw materials and NCB samples are
shown in Table 2. The average particle sizes of slag, POFA, RHA
and OPC are 14.67, 57.13, 8.65, and 16.17 lm, respectively. All
NCB samples have an average particle size of approximately
10 lm. This result indicates that the POFA (as received) has larger
particle size compared to OPC. The materials have a high specific
surface area (lower grain size) except for POFA. The slag has an
extensively high specific surface area of 1.136 m2/cm3, which is
more than 1.5 times that of OPC. All of the NCB have a fineness va-
lue of either Blaine or BET of more than four times greater than that
of OPC. NCB3 and NCB4 have a specific surface area that is three
times greater than that of the OPC sample.
3.1.3. Microstructure and morphology of materials
SEM images of the raw materials and the NCB are shown in
Fig. 1. POFA and RHA show very porous and spongy structures,
which explain their high specific surfaces. RHA particles are
angular, cellular and spongy. POFA (as received from industry) con-
tains mostly spherical particle with a small amount of plerospheres
and irregular-shaped particles with a sizeable fraction of porous
cellular structure. The slag has square and diamond shapes,
whereas the OPC sample has box and stone shapes. The SEM image
of NCB is also presented in Fig. 1(e–h), which reveals that most
plerospheres and large, irregular-shaped particles of the RHA and
POFA samples were crushed into smaller ones after grinding. NCB
contains very irregularly shaped particles with a porous cellular
surface, which increases the fineness and surface area of the
material.
The XRD patterns of the materials are shown in Fig. 2. Fig-
ure indicates that RHA mainly contains amorphous materials with
a small quantity of crystalline phase as cristobalite (high tempera-
ture phase of SiO2) and sylvite. The XRD pattern of the slag shows a
crystalline phase of amorphous silica. The XRD pattern of POFA
shows that it is mainly composed of crystalline phases such as
quartz and mullite. Only a few small peaks could be identified as
crystalline silica, which is different from the XRD patterns of the
slag and RHA. The amorphous silica present in these materials is
responsible for the pozzolanic activity.
3.2. Consistency of pastes
The consistency values of OPC and NCB-pastes are shown in Ta-
ble 3. The consistency of OPC is 30%, whereas, that of the NCB-
pastes show increased values. The NCB consistency for the ground
pastes varies between 33% and 45%. By contrast, NCB (UG) pastes,
obtained from the ungrounded POFA and RHA, show a high consis-
tency (water demand) compared to the OPC and NCB (G) samples
because of the porous and spongy particles of POFA and RHA
(Fig. 1a and b) and the presence of more voids in the particles. Gan-
esan et al. [9] reported that the consistency of RHA-blended pastes
gradually increased due to addition and increment of RHA content.
Therefore, the blended pastes of pozzolanic materials show greater
consistency than that of the OPC pastes. This argument is similar to
that was reported by Cheerarot and Jaturapitakkul [28]. They re-
ported that the normal consistency of OPC paste is lower than that
of the blended paste of FA.

Table 2
Chemical and physical properties of the materials (% by weight).

Materials Chemical properties

SiO2 Al2O3 Fe2O3 CaO MgO SO3 Na2O K2O P2O5 TiO2 MnO LOI
Slag 33.05 16.36 0.53 45.0 6.41 1.21 0.13 0.42 – – – 3.05
POFA 47.22 2.24 2.65 6.48 5.86 9.19 1.22 11.86 5.37 0.17 0.10 5.42
RHA 87.75 0.38 0.19 1.04 0.69 0.56 0.05 2.83 1.31 0.02 0.07 3.04
OPC 20.99 4.60 4.44 67.17 2.53 2.98 0.03 0.16 – – – 1.3
NCB1 (G)* 38.72 10.71 1.38 29.59 6.19 4.40 0.57 5.00 – – – 4.41
NCB2 (G)* 43.62 9.68 1.26 26.74 5.64 4.02 0.51 4.78 – – – 6.02
NCB3 (G)* 48.52 8.65 1.14 23.88 5.09 3.63 0.46 4.56 – – – 6.87
NCB4 (G)* 53.43 7.61 1.02 21.03 4.54 3.25 0.41 4.35 – – – 6.92
Physical properties
Materials Specific gravity Grain size (lm) Fineness (m2/g) Specific surface area (m2/cm3) Pore volume (cm3/g)
d10 d50 d90 Blaine BET
Slag 2.85 2.66 14.67 37.57 0.3919 1.99 1.136 0.00619
POFA (UG) 2.16 5.40 57.13 305.21 0.1977 1.89 0.435 0.00639
POFA (G) 2.31 2.15 16.08 167.13 0.4582 12.57 1.008 0.01724
RHA (UG) 1.94 1.98 8.65 38.75 0.5750 – 1.265 –
RHA (G) 2.08 1.68 6.63 29.20 0.6964 12.68 1.532 0.00675
OPC 3.14 3.36 16.17 47.37 0.2302 1.52 0.725 0.00310
NCB1 (G) 2.61 1.26 10.85 54.93 0.8510 6.22* 1.872 –
NCB2 (G) 2.58 1.18 10.20 51.61 0.8868 6.86* 1.952 –
NCB3 (G) 2.46 1.27 9.45 44.84 0.9191 7.51* 2.022 –
NCB4 (G) 2.41 1.10 9.20 49.07 0.9299 8.16* 2.045 –
*
Calculated based on the mix ratio given in Table 1.
 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902 897

Fig. 1. SEM images of raw materials and NCB.

3.3. Setting time of pastes slag and POFA are used, but increases when RHA is added (for
NCB2, NCB3 and NCB4). The initial setting time of OPC pastes
The initial and final setting times of OPC and NCB pastes are was 133 min. For the case of 30% RHA utilization (NCB4), the initial
presented in Table 3. The setting time of NCB1 is lower when only setting time is highest among all the binders. The final setting time
898 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902

the NCB3 and NCB4 mortars even though SP was added in the mor-
tars. A 3.5% SP was used for NCB4 (G), but the flow is still lower
compared with other mortars of NCB and OPC. The mortars of
the ungrounded NCB samples exhibit the lowest flow value; hence,
requires more amount of SP. A lower flow ability of the NCB-mor-
tar was observed due to more water demand from the slag, POFA
and RHA that were used in preparing NCB. This decreased flow ten-
dency occurs because of the porous and spongy nature of the
microstructure of these materials (particularly for POFA and RHA,
can be observed from Fig. 1) and an increased fineness or surface
area. Thus, more water is needed. Ahmad and Sheikh [33] reported
that more water is required to obtain the desired consistency be-
Fig. 2. XRD patterns of the raw materials.
cause low flow ability is a common nature of pozzolans.

Table 3 3.5. Compressive strength of mortar

Consistency, setting time and flow of the paste/mortar of NCB and OPC.

Properties Binder 3.5.1. Effect of NaOH on strength of mortar

OPC NCB1 NCB1 NCB2 NCB2 NCB3 NCB3 NCB4 NCB4
(UG) (G) (UG) (G) (UG) (G) (UG) (G)
Consistency 30 33 32.5 42 36.9 56 40
(%)
Initial setting 133 28 25 50 42 105 50 200
time (min)
Final setting 310 100 90 155 140 225 195 720
time (min)
Flow (%) 81 51 75 43 52 59 51
also increased for NCB4. The final setting times of all NCB pastes
(except for ungrounded NCB4) are in agreement with the ASTM
limit for the final setting time of OPC (less than or equal to
375 min according to ASTM C150) [29]. It is well known that for
the case of OPC, an excess amount of silica increases the strength
of the cement, but its setting time is prolonged. In addition, larger
quantities of alumina quicken the setting but weaken the cement
[30]. Similarly, among all of the NCB-pastes, NCB1 (G) sets early
due to its lesser amount of silica and higher content of alumina,
whereas NCB4 (UG) takes a longer time to set due to its greater
content of silica and less amount of alumina. This fact can be ob-
served from the oxide composition of NCB as shown in Table 2.
Although, NCB contains higher content of silica than that of OPC
but NCB sets earlier than OPC. Because setting time of NCB is not
only depends on its silica and alumina content but also setting
time of NCB influenced by the amount/concentration of NaOH.
Even though same amount of NaOH was used into all of the
NCB-paste, but concentration of NaOH was reduced for NCB2,
NCB3 and NCB4 due to utilization of more amount of water (i.e.,
larger values of normal consistency of the NCB2, NCB3 and
NCB4). Therefore, setting time of NCB2, NCB3 and NCB4 is pro-
longed gradually. Besides, the coarser particle size of POFA and
the spongy particle size of RHA could be the reasons for the longer
setting time of the paste. In addition, they absorb more water (ob-
served from the normal consistency data) and caused the delay of
the hydration process. Smaller-sized particles usually react quickly
than coarser particles. Particles with a diameter of 1 and 10 lm
will react within 1 day and 1 month, respectively, whereas parti-
cles over 50 lm will not completely react with sufficient amounts
of water [31]. Tangchirapat et al. [32] also reported an increased
setting time in the paste after OPC was replaced by POFA.
3.4. Flow of mortars
The measured flow of the mortars is shown in Table 3. The flow
of the OPC mortar is over 80% without SP. The flow decreased for
The compressive strength of a mortar is one of the important
properties of a binder. Therefore, to determine compressive
strength of NCB mortar, initially, a dosage of NaOH was chosen
67 44.5
based on some trials using the NCB4 (G) mortar specimen. The
70 NCB4 (G) achieved a compressive strength of 30.64, 40.68 and
38.36 MPa at 28 days for the utilization of 2.5%, 5.0% and 7.5%
220 NaOH, respectively. The lower content (2.5%) of NaOH may not suf-
ficient to activate all of the molecules of NCB; hence, NCB-mortar
62 60
achieves lower strength. For the case of higher content (7.5%), full
amount of NaOH may not require/participate for activation all of
the NCB molecules. Secondly, the excess amount of NaOH may
form weak intra-bonds between them. These weak bonds may col-
lapse when NCB-mortar immersed into water. Consequently,
strength of NCB-mortar reduced. On the other hand, NCB-mortars
achieve highest strength using 5% NaOH. Thus, the utilization of
5% NaOH could be considered as optimum dose for the strength
development of NCB-mortar. Recently, Mohamad and Zeedan
[34] obtained a lower strength in alkali activated binder due to
lower and/or excess doses of activator beyond 5%. They obtained
a compressive strength of 12.80 MPa, 16.90 MPa, 18.70 MPa, and
10.65 MPa in alkali activated binder (paste) containing 75% slag
with 25% silica fume due to utilization of 3%, 4%, 5% and 6% NaOH
with sodium silicate, respectively, in room temperature curing re-
gime. Therefore, for the current study, strength of NCB-mortar con-
taining lower (2.5%), optimum (5%), and/or higher (7.5%) doses of
NaOH seems to be practical. It is to be noted that NCB does not per-
form as a binder without utilization of NaOH, if there is availability
of water. Thus, NaOH works as a binding agent and also functions
as a bridge/medium to establish links and/or bonds among the
molecules of NCB and sand with the presence of water. Therefore,
to use the NCB as an alternative binder, NaOH is the key ingredient
for the strength development of NCB-mortar. Besides, the chemical
reaction involved in cement hydration is as follows. Cement hydra-
tion [35,36]: C3S; C2S + H2O ? CSH–gel + Ca(OH)2. Similarly,
strength of NCB is developed may be due to following chemical
reaction:
NCBðCaO=SiO2 =Al2 O3 Þ þ NaOH þ H2 O
! Na—CSH—gel—Al þ CaðOHÞ2
3.5.2. Effect of NCB on strength of mortar
Strengths of NCB-mortars with 5% NaOH at different ages are
presented in Table 4. The strength development of the NCB mortars
are similar to that of the OPC, in which a reasonable strength is
achieved at early and later ages. The NCB1 (60% slag, 40% POFA
and 0% RHA) mortar had a lesser strength compared to the OPC
mortar. NCB4 (mortars cast with 42% slag, 28% POFA and 30%
RHA) achieves the highest strength among NCBs. This better
 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902 899

strength was found due to more silica [30] present in the NCB4
compared to other NCBs that can be seen from oxide composition
of materials (Table 2). The compressive strengths of NCB3 and
NCB4 mortars at 3 and 7 days are greater than those specified in
ASTM C150 [29] (the minimum strength of OPC type I cement is
12 and 19 MPa at 3 and 7 days, respectively). Strength of NCB
developed because of higher fineness, which is an important prop-
erty that enhance the strength of the mortar. The grinding tech-
niques of POFA and RHA have been demonstrated as a kind of
mechanical activation for NCB. Consequently, the strength of the
mortar produced from ungrounded NCB is slightly less than that
of the grounded NCB. This happens due to coarser particles present
in ungrounded samples which react slowly than that of fine parti-
cles [31]; the reasons have been explained at the end of Section 3.3.
Thus, grinding and the particle size of pozzolans are vital factors in
enhancing mortar strength. Kiattikomol et al. [37] found that a
mortar with 20% OPC replacement had higher strength with higher
fineness of FA. A comparable strength was found with a higher
fineness in grounded RHA. Furthermore, the OPC mortar and con-
crete that had finer RHA had better strength [10,38,39].
Table 4 also shows that the strength of mortar without RHA (i.e.,
NCB1) is less but strength of mortar increases with the presence of
RHA (for NCB2, NCB3 and NCB4). Thus, RHA could have a function/
contribution as another activator for NCB. Therefore, with the pres-
ence of NaOH, NCB contributes in developing strength of mortar
may be due to the following combined effects:
 Higher fineness of materials (i. e., the grinding effects) that lead
to the increase in surface area or larger fineness value of NCB
which can be called as mechanical activation.
 NCB4 achieves the highest compressive strength because of its
higher silica and lesser alumina contents [30] that can be
observed from the oxide composition of NCB (Table 2).
 The chemical cross-linking action of RHA with the presence of
NaOH.
3.5.3. Effect of binary/ternary blend of NCB on mortar strength
Binary and ternary combination of materials could be another
reason for the strength development of NCB-mortar. Table 4 shows
that binary combination of slag and POFA in NCB1 (G) produces a
compressive strength of 25.22 MPa with 5% NaOH at 28 days. The
ternary combination of slag, POFA and RHA in NCB2 (G) achieves
a compressive strength of 36.13 MPa due to utilization of same
dose of NaOH at the same age. The ternary combinations of
NCB2, NCB3 and NCB4 produce different levels of compressive
strength. NCB4 achieves highest strength followed by NCB3 and
NCB2 due to the variation of their chemical composition, mainly
for the silica, alumina and iron oxide (Table 2). Binary or ternary
combinations give better result as compared to that of individual
one which has been reported in several past studies. For alkali acti-
vated binder, Mohamad and Zeedan [34] obtained a lower strength
(4.1 MPa) when they utilized 100% slag; but, they found a higher
compressive strength of 18.0 MPa with combination of 75% slag
with 25% silica fume. They also found a compressive strength of
21.21 MPa using 50% slag and 50% silica fume for the same amount
of activator and curing condition at 28 days. According to a study
by Chi and Huang [17], the binary combination of slag with fly
ash achieves better strength in alkali activated mortar than that
of individual one for the same materials and curing conditions. In
the case of partial replacement of cement, other researches also re-
ported that binary/ternary blends of pozzolans give better strength
than that of individual replacements [11,12]. This better strength
development of mortar is observed in the binary and/or ternary
combination of pozzolans due to the synergic effect of materials
[12,40].
3.6. Flexural stress and strain of mortar
The flexural strengths of the NCB and OPC mortars are pre-
sented in Table 4. The flexural strength of NCB mortars varies with
that of the OPC at the same age. The flexural strength of NCB is less
but comparable with that of OPC at 28 days. The NCB (UG) mortars
had a slightly less flexural strength compared with the ground
samples because of the ungrounded RHA and POFA were used in
preparing the test specimens. However, the flexural strength of
the NCB mortar falls within a considerable range. The strengths
of the mortars increased with increasing RHA content. Habeeb
and Fayyadh [41] reported that flexural strength in concrete sys-
tematically increased with increasing RHA content up to 20%
replacement of OPC. Table 4 shows that the ratio of flexural-to-
compressive strength is found to be 16–25% (for NCB4 slightly over
16%) and 20.3% for NCB and OPC mortars, respectively. Binici et al.
[42] obtained a flexural-to-compressive strength ratio of 16.80%
and 15.87% for OPC and 15%-slag blended mortar, respectively.
Form another study, Binici et al. [43] also found this ratio as
17.30% and 16.80% for OPC and 20%-slag blended mortar, respec-
tively. Thus, flexural strength of NCB mortar for the present study
seems to be rational. Table 4 also implies that strain values of NCB
(1.0–1.9%) are less than OPC (2.1%). NCB2 shows the highest strain
value of 1.90% among all the mortars, whereas OPC shows a strain
of 2.02%. Thus, it seems that NCB mortar is slightly more brittle
compared to that of OPC mortar. Therefore, the flexural strength
of the NCB mortar is slightly inferior but comparable with that of
OPC mortar. This lower value of flexural strength of NCB-mortar
is obtained may be due to its less compressive strength.
3.7. SEM observation of mortar
The SEM images of the mortars obtained (at 28 days) from NCB
and OPC are shown in Fig. 3. Large differences can be observed
from the microstructures of NCB and OPC mortars. The microstruc-
tures of NCB mortars changed from large pores or honey combs to

Table 4
Compressive strength, flexural stress and strain of the NCB and OPC mortars.

Binders Compressive strength (MPa) Flexural strength (MPa) Flexural strain (%) at max. flexural stress
3 days 7 days 14 days 28 days 3 days 7 days 14 days 28 days 3 days 7 days 14 days 28 days
OPC 24.94 30.32 35.08 44.08 – – 8.08 8.99 – – 1.48 2.02
NCB1 (UG) 5.12 12.34 16.10 18.22 – – 4.47 4.56 – – 1.11 1.75
NCB1 (G) 6.93 15.68 22.85 25.22 – – 5.57 6.14 – – 1.48 1.52
NCB2 (UG) 12.32 18.22 28.33 31.56 – – 5.25 5.72 – – 0.94 1.90
NCB2 (G) 14.16 23.81 32.53 36.13 – 6.00 6.11 – – 1.10 1.39
NCB3 (UG) 16.22 18.34 28.87 34.52 – 4.59 5.67 – – 0.81 1.88
NCB3 (G) 23.00 28.21 33.58 39.53 – – 6.41 6.88 – – 0.99 1.77
NCB4 (UG) 17.33 19.30 23.21 33.34 – – 5.18 5.63 – – 1.16 1.72
NCB4 (G) 23.12 28.91 32.33 40.68 – - 5.67 6.57 – – 1.33 1.62
900 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902

Fig. 3. SEM images of NCB and OPC mortars at 28 days.

homogeneous small pores as the RHA percent was increased. This NCB3 and NCB4 contain 10%, 20%, and 30% RHA, respectively.
result is due to the fact that NCB1 contains 0% RHA, whereas NCB2, Therefore, the strength development of NCB mortars is related to
 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902 901

molecules in the NCB mortar are observed to fabricated with a sil-

ica–hydrate (Si–H) bond with sodium or other inorganic metals
(i.e., calcium–silica–hydrate gel-alumina).

4. Conclusions

Based on the overall experimental test results, the following

conclusions are drawn from the present study:

(i) A non-cement composite binder (NCB) could be fabricated

Fig. 4. XRD patterns of the NCB and OPC mortars at 28 days.
the use of RHA up to a specific limit (i.e., oxide composition and sil-
ica content of NCB as observed in Table 2). The fine particles of RHA
fill the small pores of the NCB and consequently increase mortar
density, which also increases compressive strength. In addition,
the existence of ettringite is confirmed in the SEM image of OPC,
whereas ettringite is not observed in the SEM view of NCB mortars.
Therefore, the strength development of NCB and OPC mortars is
different.
3.8. XRD analysis of mortar
The XRD patterns of NCB and OPC mortars (at 28 days) are pre-
sented in Fig. 4. The figure shows that NCB mortars contain mainly
crystalline materials with a small quantity of amorphous phase.
The NCB mortars exhibit peaks of silica, quartz, and syngenite at
an angle of 18°, 27°, 36°, and 38° at 2h. The peak of calcite is ob-
served in OPC samples at an angle of 28° at 2h. Ca(OH)2 peaks
are seen in OPC samples at an angle of 18°, 34°, and 51° at 2h. Alu-
from slag, POFA and RHA with NaOH as activator at normal
temperature curing regime.
(ii) NCB can be used as a substitute of cement provided that
Blaine fineness of NCB should be more than 8000 cm2/g to
obtain satisfactory strength.
(iii) Consistency, setting time and flow of NCB paste/mortars are
greatly influenced by the mix proportion of materials. The
NCB4 (42% slag, 28% POFA and 30% RHA) with 5% NaOH
shows reasonable consistency and setting times (i.e., initial
setting time 70 min, final setting time 220 min). Obtained
flow value of NCB-mortars is also reasonable with the pres-
ence of SP.
(iv) Strength of NCB-mortar is remarkably influenced by the mix
proportion, fineness of materials and amount of NaOH. NCB4
achieves the highest compressive strength of 40.68 MPa and
a flexural strength of 6.57 MPa with 5% NaOH at 28 days.
Thus, the combination of 42% slag, 28% POFA and 30% RHA
could be considered as optimum mix for the fabrication of
NCB with a 5% (optimum) dose of NaOH.
(v) NCB can only perform as a binder due to the presence of
NaOH. NaOH contributes as a binding agent and also func-
tions as a medium to make links and/or bond among the
90
NCB2 NCB1 OPC
80
Transmitance (%)

70
minum sulfate hydrate and albite peaks are seen in the NCB2 and
60
NCB4 mortars at 25° and 28°, respectively, at 2h.
50

3.9. FTIR analysis of mortar 40

30
The obtained FTIR results are shown in Fig. 5. The figure shows
20
that characteristic bands are observed in NCB1 at wavelengths of
3728, 3426, 2596, 1585, 1452, 1257, 982, 651, and 417 cm1; at 10
300 800 1300 1800 2300 2800 3300 3800
3823, 3224, 2674, 1599, 1304, 1208, 977, 658, and 431 cm1 for
NCB2; and at almost the same wavelengths for the NCB3, NCB4, Wave Number (cm-1)
and OPC mortar types. The band at 3728 cm1 or 3823 cm1 may
be due to the presence of calcium hydroxide. The band near 90
3400 cm1 (3300 cm1 to 3640 cm1) is mainly due to the hydro- NCB4 NCB3 OPC
80
gen bond vibration in the group either as H–OH or Si–OH group
Transmitance (%)

[44,45]. The absorption band at near 1600 cm1 may be due to free 70
water molecules. The presence of such bands indicates that the
60
water molecules are freely absorbed in the cement pores or are at-
tached on the surface of calcium silicate hydrate (C–S–H). The band 50
at 1452 cm1 is due to the carbonate (CO2 3 ) group. The broad band 40
ranging from 950 cm1 to 1200 cm1 is due to the C–S–H structure
(band at 3450 and 1600 cm1 correspond to C–S–H). The band at 30
982 cm1 may be due to the presence of a Si–O bond (i.e., sodium 20
metasilicate (Na2SiO35H2O)) [46]. The bands at approximately
880 cm1 may be due to calcite. The bands at 658 cm1 may be 10
300 800 1300 1800 2300 2800 3300 3800
due to Al–O vibrations of the aluminate mineral components.
Wave Number (cm-1)
The bands near 417 cm1 may be due to Si–O. Similar observations
are also found in previous studies [44,45]. Therefore, most of the Fig. 5. FTIR analyses of the NCB and OPC mortars at 28 days.
902 M.R. Karim et al. / Construction and Building Materials 49 (2013) 894–902
molecules of NCB and sand with the presence of water.
Therefore, NaOH is the key constituent for the development
of NCB.
(vi) FTIR results show that molecules in the NCB-mortar are con-
structed by silica–hydrate (Si–H) bond with sodium or other
inorganic metals (i.e., sodium/calcium–silica–hydrate–alu-
mina gel).
(vii) When slag, POFA and RHA are used in NCB as substitute of
cement, the demand of cement is reduced. Therefore, these
wastes can be properly disposed by their successful utiliza-
tion as a non-cement binder.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the Almighty Allah for contin-
uing this research. In particular, we appreciated and were grateful
to the financial support and experimental assistance given by the
University Kebangsaan Malaysia; Ministry of Science, Technology
and Innovation; Fundamental Research Grant Scheme; and Depart-
ment of Civil and Structural Engineering in performing this re-
search. The first author would like to thank Dhaka University of
Engineering and Technology for permitting his study-leave for
the research.
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