Special Concretes

Waim Akshay Ravindra

 Special Cocnretes
• Light Weight Concrete
• The density of concrete is 2.4kN/m3 which makes it very heavy
• Attempts have been made to reduce the weight of the concrete and so was light weight
concrete invented
• A light weight concrete is a concrete with a density ranging from 300-1800 kN/m3

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 Special Cocnretes
• Advantages:
• It helps in reduction of dead load
• Increase the progress of the building
• The load of the slab and beam to be bore by column. If the concrete used in the process
is lighter, it reduces the loading coming from top and more economical designs can be
considered
• Light weight concrete is poor in thermal conductivity, which is more useful when air-
conditioned buildings are involved. It helps in keeping the room cool as heat from outer
environment is not transferred inside

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 Special Cocnretes
• The following options thru which normal concrete can be made into light
weight concrete
• By introduction of gas bubbles/ air bubbles in mortar. The process is called as aeration
and the concrete is termed as aerated concrete
• As sand is heavier, we can omit the sand fines and increase the coarse aggregates in the
mixture. Such type of concrete is termed as ‘no-fines- concrete.
• By replacing the mineral aggregates with cellular porous/ light weight aggregates

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Special Cocnretes

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 Use of Light Weight Aggregates
• Light weight aggregates can be classified as:
• Natural Light-weight aggregates
• Artificial Light-weight aggregates

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 Natural light-weight aggregates
1. Pumice
• Rocks of volcanic origin, they are light in weight but strong at the same time
• Their lightness is due to the gas escaping from the molten lava, they are oldest kind of aggregates
2. Diatomite
• These amorphous silica rocks are derived from aquatic plants called diatoms
• It is available on the ocean bed.
• Generallly, when Diatomite in pure form is 0.45 Kn/m 3 but in impure form is available >0.45kN/m 3
3. Scorcia
• It is also of volcanic origin and is dark in colour but is weaker in strength when compared to pumice
4. Volcanic cinders
• Lose volcanic products resembling aritificial cinder
5. Saw dust
• Saw dust is obtained from soft wood manufacturing/cutting
• Due to presence of tannins, the setting time of the OPC is adversely affected. Thus it is removed using lime powder or boiling in water or using ferrous
sulphate
• It has been observed that shrinkage is saw dust is very high, thus can shall be maintained at cement/sawdust ratio of 1:2-1:3
• Used for manufacture of precast products, flooring and roofing tiles
6. Rice Husk
• Rice husk, groundnut husk or baggase husk has been used for the manufacture of the light-weight concrete
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 Artificial light-weight aggregates
1. Brick Bats
• They are overburnt bricks which are light-weight and can be used as aggregates
• They aren’t costly and can be used especially when high alumina concrete is used
• They do not absorb much water

2. Cinder Clinker and breeze

• These are obtained after the combustion of the coal
• The use of cinder/clinker are getting outdated due to use of pulveriszed coal instead of use of lumps of coal

3. Foamed Slag
• Blast furnace slag when dipped (quenched) in limited water forms honeycomb-like porous structure which can be used as aggregates

4. Bloated Clay
• Glass and shale(clay) when heated together at very high temperature fuse together and increase in volume in several fold due to production of gases within
• They have been used by CBRI, India for the construction of standing structures

5. Sintered Fly Ash

• Fly ash is formed due to combustion of powdered coal, and is glassy and spherical in shape
• It is mixed with water and turned into pellets and again sintered at 1000°C-1200°C.
• It has a very high strength to density ratio which makes it ideal as light weight aggregate

6. Exfoliated Vermiculite
• Raw vermiculite is a material originating from Mica (metal) and has a laminar structure. When heated it expands in volume and this process is termed as exfoliation.
• A fully exfoliated vermiculite expands by almost 30 times the volume with a density of 0.06 – 0.13 kN/m 3 .
• With low density comes low strength and this phenomena makes it useless for structural construction purposes VNR VJIET
Artificial light-weight aggregates

Foamed slag

Cinder, clinker and breeze

Brick bat

bloated clay Exfoliated Vermiculite

Sintered fly ash
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Properties of light-weight aggregates

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Properties of light-weight concrete

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 Aerated Concrete
• Aerated concrete is made by introducing air or gas into a slurry of OPC/ lime +
finely crushed siliceous filler
• when the mix sets and hardens, a uniformly cellular structure is formed.
• It is also called as gas concrete and is known by siphorex in India
• There are several ways in which aerated concrete can be manufactured:
• By formation of gas by chemical reaction during liquid/plastic state
• By mixing foam into the slurry
• By mixing Aluminum powder which reacts with calcium hydroxide to form hydrogen gas
which causes aeration
• Adding powdered zinc/ Hydrogen peroxide/ bleaching powder instead of aluminum
powder
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Properties
• Aerated concrete does not only have a low density but also has a
bettered thermal insulation property
• The density ranges from 0.3kN/m3 – 0.8kN/m3
• The low dense structure are used for insulation purpose only whilst the medium dense concrete is used for load bearing
walls. High density concrete is used for the construction of precast structures.

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Properties
• Aerated concrete does not only have a low density but also has a
bettered thermal insulation property
• The density ranges from 0.3kN/m3 – 0.8kN/m3
• The low dense structure are used for insulation purpose only whilst the medium dense concrete is used for load bearing
walls. High density concrete is used for the construction of precast structures.

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No-fines concrete
• The third method of production light weight concrete by omitting the
fine aggregates from the mixture
• In no-fines concrete, sometimes only single sized aggregates are used
mostly in the size range of 10mm to 20mm

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Mix proportion for no-fines concrete
• The aggregate/cement ratio is generally 6:1 to 10:1
• Aggregates used normally range in the size of 10mm to 20mm
• The w/c ratio for satisfactory workability shall be in range of 0.38 to 0.52 and
shall be chosen with care
• No-fine concrete with normal aggregates show a density of 1.6-1.9kN/m3 whilst
the no-fine concrete with light weight aggregate shows a density of about 0.36
kN/m3
• No-fine concrete does not need vibration for compaction as simple rodding is
sufficient
• Also the pressure/thrust on formwork is less when compared to conventional
con

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