Al-Maaref University 

 
Faculty of Engineering  
Department of Civil Engineering

Course code: CIE290L 

Course Title: construction materials Lab   

Experiment Title: Specific Gravity and absorption of fine aggregate

Instructor :  Dr Mayyad Assad 

Group A

Students Name:

Zeinab Mahdi 10119012

Mohammad Assaf 10119171

Alaa Rachid 10119216

 1- Objective :  the objective of this test is to calculate the specific gravity of a fine aggregate sample
by determining the ratio of the weight of a given volume of aggregate to the weight of an equal
volume of water.

2- Test Procedure :
2.1. Test setup:

2.2. Materials :
a- Balance
b-Pycnometer or flask
c- Tamper
d- Mold
e- funnel

2.3. Procedure :

a- Take a clean, dry pycnometer and determine its empty weight (W₁ g).
b- Take a clean sample of fine aggregate for which specific gravity is to be find out and
transfer that to the pycnometer and weight (W₂ g). and Pour distilled water in the
pycnometer with aggregate sample at the temperature at 27 ºC, to just immerse
sample.
c- Immediately after immersion, remove the entrapped air from the sample by shaking
or rotating the pycnometer, placing a finger on the hole at the top of the sealed
pycnometer.
d- Wipe out the outer surface of pycnometer. Now the pycnometer is completely filled
up with water till the hole at the top, and after confirming that there is no more
entrapped air in pycnometer, weight it (W₃ g).
e-Transfer the aggregate of the pycnometer into a try care being taken to ensure that all
the aggregate is transferred. Clean the pycnometer.
f- Refill the pycnometer with distilled water up to the top of the pycnometer, without
any entrapped air.  It should be completely dry from outside and take the weight (W₄ g).
g-For mineral filler, specific gravity bottle is used and the material is filled up to one-
third of the capacity of bottle. The rest of the process of determining specific gravity is
similar to the one described above.

3. Results
A
Specific dry gravity (OD) =
B−C
 B
Specific saturated gravity (SSD) =
B−C

A
Apparent Specific gravity=
A−C

B− A
Absorption, % = × 100
A

Where:

A = mass of oven dry test sample in air, g = 717.3 g

B = mass of saturated surface dry test sample in air, g = 725.4 g

C = apparent mass of saturated test sample in water, g = 693.8g

4. Conclusion :

Specific gravity of fine aggregate (sand)  is the ratio of the weight of given volume of aggregates to
the weight of equal volume of water.