Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275

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Construction and Building Materials

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

Workability and proportion design of pumping concrete based

on rheological parameters
Haibo Xie a, Feng Liu a,⇑, Yurun Fan a, Huayong Yang a, Jian Chen a, Jin Zhang b, Chungen Zuo b
a
State Key Lab. of Fluid Power Transmission and Control, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province 310027, China
b
Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science & Technology Development Co., Ltd., Changsha, Hunan Province 410000, China

h i g h l i g h t s

 We used concrete rheometer to test the exact rheology parameters of concrete.

 A quantified define of rheology parameters have been found based on workability.
 Different proportions for concrete design have been comprehensively proposed in this paper.

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

Article history: In this paper a method is introduced to find an optimized ratio of pumping concrete based on concrete
Received 31 October 2012 rheology. Workability includes three aspects: fluidity, bleeding resistance and segregation resistance.
Received in revised form 16 January 2013 We tested concrete samples with various water-to-binder ratio (W/B), fly-ash to binder ratio (FA/B),
Accepted 26 February 2013
sand-to-aggregate ratio (S/A) and the dose of liquid naphthalene water reducer (FDN/B) by using a con-
Available online 9 April 2013
crete rheometer. Using concrete rheometer to measure the yield stress and viscosity based on Bingham
model, and then study the rheological regulation of concretes by changing the component proportions.
Keywords:
The samples also have been tested for quantifying bleeding and segregation. We obtained the relation-
Workability(A)
Rheology(A)
ship between the workability aspects (the bleeding speed, segregation speed and fluidity) and the rheo-
Mixture proportioning(A) logical parameters, thus obtained appropriate ranges of proportions for the good workability of concrete
pumping.
Crown Copyright Ó 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Concrete pumping technology was first appeared in Germany in
1972 and has been rapidly developed in recent years. Now con-
crete pumping technology is already one of the primary means
for construction programs. Compared to the traditional way for
concrete construction, the concrete is pumped through a pipe by
concrete pumping truck; the properties and proportions of pump-
ing concrete are quite different from that of traditional concrete.
The feasibility that concrete could (can) be pumped is defined as
workability, also called pumpability or flowability. Generally, con-
sidering the construction demand and characteristics of pumped
concrete, workability contains three aspects, fluidity, bleeding
resistance and segregation resistance [1]. Many scholars are con-
centrating on the study of concrete workability and how to im-
prove it. However, there still lack an effective way to evaluate
the workability, even an explicit definition. Based on JGJ/T10-95,
before pumped, the concrete should have a slump between 140
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 057187952500; fax: +86 57187952507.
E-mail address: zz_liangxin@163.com (F. Liu).
and 160 cm when pumping height is 30–60 m, and now the
broadly used way to evaluate concrete workability is the slump
test [2]. Saaka introduced the slump of concrete is related to yield
stress [3], slump test could reflect yield stress of concrete, which
means rheological parameters could be used to evaluate pumping
concrete. However, viscosity could be related to some of concrete
workability which the slump test could not depict [7]. So using
rheology parameters to evaluate pumping concrete is reasonable
[4].
It is already known [13] that proportion change influences con-
crete rheology, and workability is also changed. This is the base of
relating workability to rheology. Based on Domone’s study, the
coarse aggregate content, paste content (fly ash or other paste),
water/powder ratio, additive (water reducer or viscosity-modify-
ing agent) all impacts the concrete rheology and workability [16].
Mixture design of concrete is an often discussed topic in con-
crete study, concrete’s workability varies with the proportion
change. Tregger et al. [5] mentioned a way to test the segregation
of self-consolidating concrete via adding different ratios of viscos-
ity-modifying agent (VMA). They conducted a mini-slump flow test
and show the distribution of aggregates around the core in Figs. 1

0950-0618/$ - see front matter Crown Copyright Ó 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2013.02.051
268 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275
Fig. 1. Concentric areas where aggregate contents were wet-sieved, dried and
weighed to calculate the radial aggregate distribution [4].
Fig. 2. TF plotted against increasing VMA content for a final diameter of 70 cm [4].
and 2, in the mini-slump flow test, in which with the same final
diameter DF, concrete with more VMA has higher final time TF,
i.e., higher segregation resistance, and the linear line of the relative
aggregate density versus the normalized radial distance has miner
slope, shown in Fig. 3. The formula to compute relative aggregate
density is shown in Eq. (1). So adding VMA can enhance concrete’s
segregation resistance ability.
Relative aggregate density
 Bingham model is expressed by Eq. (2), where s is shear stress, s0 is yield stress, l is
aggregate content of region volume of region
¼ ð1Þ
total aggregate content total volume
As shown in Figs. 4 and 5, to test the impact of adding HRWRA
to concrete, Perrot et al. [6] conducted slump flow test on the sam-
ples’ bleeding-water-thickness in a 450 mm height and 30 mm
diameter cylindrical tube, the samples were tested for different
water-to-cement ratio and different HRWRA ratio, for the regula-
tion of bleeding with water-cement ratio and HRWRA ratio, they
draw a graph of critical water-to-cement ratio versus HRWRA ratio,
which represents the bleeding resistance.
From Nathan Tregger et al. and Perrot’s et al. studies, concrete
workability has close relations with component proportion; results
Fig. 3. Relative aggregate density as a function of normalized radial spread for a
final diameter of 70 cm [4].
of rheology test method of concrete such as slump flow test could
be related to concrete workability. Each proportion’s impact on the
three aspects of workability still needs research. Existing workabil-
ity test methods such as V-funnel test or L-box test is to test the
flow behavior of concrete but all suffered the same shortcomings
as the slump test. Although have different rheology parameters,
concrete could have the same result in V-funnel test or L-box test
[6,8], so these method are not able enough to distinguish concrete
with different workability. The purpose of this article is to propos-
ing a method to optimize the concrete proportioning by studying
the change of workability of concrete pumping with the change
of major component proportions, and to establish the relationship
between the Bingham parameters and component proportions, to
quantify the degree of fluidity, bleeding resistance and segregation
resistance, to find appropriate yield stress and viscosity for con-
crete, and finally to define a workability box in which the concrete
is flowable and stable. With this workability box one can easily car-
ried out the proportion design to optimize workability of pumping
concrete.
2. Experiment design
2.1. Principle of the experiment
Concrete workability changes with different proportion designs. To study the
way for enhancing workability by changing the proportion, test methods are de-
scribed in this section. From earlier studies, proportion’s change such as the
water-to-cement ratio, fly ash to binder ratio, sand-to-aggregate ratio and the dose
of water reducer can influence the workability apparently.
s ¼ s0 þ lc_ ð2Þ
Tattersall and Beaupre [8,9] considered the concrete is a kind of Bingham fluid.
The Bingham fluid behavior is described by plasticity and viscosity. As Fig. 6 shows,
viscosity and c_ is shear rate [10].
Then yield stress and viscosity of concrete, could be measured by using concrete
rheometer directly.
With completely and comprehensively test of concrete rheology, not only the
relation between rheology and component proportion could be find (the fluidity
could be judged directly by the rheology parameters), but also by combining the
fluidity, bleed resistance, segregation resistance and rheology parameters, we can
relate the workability and rheology parameters. As Wallevik et al. proposed, a
workability box can be introduced, which is a convenient all rounded way to judge
the workability by checking the rheological parameters [11].
In this paper, based on JGJ55-2000, two groups concrete are designed: the Type
20 concrete (C20) group with 20 samples and Type 30 concrete (C30) group with 36
samples of concrete mixtures. When changing sample’s proportion, only one type of
proportion changes at a time among the water-to-binder ratio, sand-to-aggregate
ratio, fly-ash-to-binder ratio and the water reducer (FDN)-to-binder ratio. By test-
 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275 269

Fig. 4. Bleeding water thickness as a function of the water to cement ratio for various HRWRA dosages [5].

Fig. 5. Critical water to cement ratio below which the cement paste does bleed as a
function of the HRWRA dosage [5]. Fig. 7. The procedure of the experiment and data analysis.

Fig. 6. Sketch map of Bingham model.

ing different mixtures, the yield stress and viscosity of Bingham fluid could be
determined, and the workability’s aspects, i.e., the bleeding and segregation, were
also tested, then workability box could be obtained. Although relationships be-
tween proportion and workability are quiet complicated, judging proportion’s im-
pacts on workability is convenient via rheological parameters. The experiment
procedure and data analysis are shown in Fig. 7. Fig. 8. Components of concrete rheometer.

2.2. Measurement and test equipment

The ICAR concrete rheometer RHM-3000 produced by German Instrument Com- frame, 3 is vane and 4 is container. During the test, the gravel in concrete may col-
pany was used to measure rheological parameters, which is shown in Fig. 8, 1 is lide the vane and make the test result noisy, so the size of container is designed for
where the driver containing a motor and a torque sensor set in a container, 2 is not having seriously crash when the vane rotate, as shown in Fig. 9, the gap be-
270 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275
Fig. 9. Gap between vane and container.
tween the vane and the container wall is 4 times larger than the biggest gravel in
the mixture, so it alleviates the gravel’s collision to the level of little impact on
the test result. During the test, time should be enough for the concrete to break
down to obtain stable data of shear stress.
2.3. Sample design
Cement used here is PO32.5 for C20 mix groups and PO42.5 for C30 mix groups,
and cements were chosen based on GB175-2007, the size of coarse aggregate is 5–
31.5 mm, fineness for sand of 2.9, liquid naphthalene water reducer (FDN), and the
class II fly ash, and the fly ash is used to replace the cement by mass.
The variation of proportions for concrete could lead to apparent change of rhe-
ology and workability [12]. The properties wildly used to change workability of
concrete are the water-to-cement ratio, proportion of fly ash, sand-to-aggregate
ratio and the proportion of water reducer. In the test, we chose the typical C20
and C30 types of concrete as basics and modulated the proportions, respectively.
In Table 1 the water-to-binder ratio W/B is from 0.36 to 0.6, indicated as sample
C20a and C30a series in which 0.36 and 0.4 is the low W/B ratio, 0.45–0.55 is the
medium W/B ratio, and 0.6 is the high W/B ratio; the sand-to-aggregate ratio S/A is
from 0.39 to 0.63, indicated as sample C20b and C30b series; the fly-ash-to-binder
ratio FA/B is from 10% to 60% as sample C20c and C30c series; the water-
reducer-to-binder ratio FDN/B is from 0.3% to 2.7% as sample C20d and C30d
series; the recommended dosage of FDN is from 1.5% to 2.5%, and 0.3% is the
low FDN dosage. When one proportion is changing, the other proportion ratios
are kept constant. Here for C20 mixes the rheological parameters as well as the
bleeding and segregation are tested, while for C30 mixes only the rheological
parameters are tested. To obtain the regulation of workability the C20 group is en-
ough, C30 group testing is added to support the relation between the rheological
parameters and the proportion changes.
2.4. Mixing and measurement procedures
Sample preparation was based on Chinese Standard GB/T14902-2003, we firstly
put the sand and aggregate into the mixer, turned on the mixer for one minute and
then put the cement, water and water reducer into the mixer, turned on the mixer
for three minute, shut down the mixer, waited for 2 min, and then started testing.
The yield stress and viscosity of the concrete were measured by the concrete
rheometer. The bleeding speed and segregation degree were quantified and the
method is described as following: a sample concrete of 3000 ml was put into a con-
tainer with 15 cm diameter and 30 cm height and the concrete was equally temped
for 10 times by a temper, flattering the surface; the container was put on ground
and stay immobile for 30 min; and then a burette was used to assimilate the water
bleeding on the surface of the concrete, and the volume of bleeding water was mea-
sured with a 5 ml graduate. As shown in Fig. 10, we took the 1000 ml concrete top
level and 1000 ml concrete down level, washed out the mortar and sand, and mea-
sured the gravel’s weight.
The bleeding parameter B is defined as shown in the following equation,
Vb
B¼  100 ð3Þ
Vw
where Vb is the volume of surface bleeding and Vw is the volume of water in the
sample.
The segregation parameter V is defined as shown in the following equation,
m2
V¼ ð4Þ
m1
where m2 the gravel’s weight of the down level and m1 is the gravel’s weight of the
up level. In practical working situations, B less than 1 means good bleeding resis-
tance, and V less than 1.1 means good segregation resistance.
3. Analysis of experimental results
3.1. Relationship of rheology and workability
When concrete has high viscosity, it often shows good cohe-
sion; since mortar is cohesive the proportions is finely united
and the chunks are fewer than that with low viscosity, so the abil-
ity to catch gravel and water is better. Higher yield stress and vis-
cosity helps settle the concrete, but they also mean higher
resistance to the transformation, so there must be constraint on
the rheological parameters to ensure the fluidity and stability of
concrete. From the proportion change test the relations between
the rheology and proportion can be obtained, however, even one
proportion change makes the rheology change complexly, like
FA/B, more fly ash decreases the yield stress but the viscosity has
complex behavior. In practical concrete design, however, it is al-
ways necessary to alternate several proportions.
The earlier studies have not quantified the rheological parame-
ters and workability parameters together and have not found a
way to directly relate them. Here a method is designed to use
the rheological parameters rather than general experience to judge
the workability. Firstly, each aspect of workability is considered by
using the rheological parameters, and then the three aspects are
combined to form a comprehensive judge on the workability in
terms of the yield stress and viscosity.
3.1.1. Rheology and fluidity
We measured the yield stresses and viscosities of the C20, C30
concrete and put them into the theoretical pressure drop formula
for a concrete transportation pipe. The pipe radius is 0.0625 m,
pipe length is 10 m, and the pumping volume is 44 m3/h. Based
on the theoretical circular pipe pressure drop formula,
sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
 
dp 2s0 2b 4m 2 b2 þ 1 4m 2b 4m
¼ þ l þ l þ sl ð5Þ
dx a au a a u 2 a u 0 a
where dp/dx is pipe pressure drop of unit longness, s0 is yield stress,
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi pffiffiffi
l is viscosity, a is radius of the pipe, u ¼ b2 þ 1 þ b, b ¼ ð2 2Þ1 v
is average speed of concrete.
Figs. 11 and 12 show the pressure drop versus the yield stress
and viscosity, respectively. As fluidity is mainly determined by
the interior friction, lower yield stress and viscosity mean better
fluidity. Under the practical working condition, over 80% of the
working conditions of pump truck in practical construction, pump
system pressure is under 170 bar. When pumping C30, adding a
90° bent pipe will increase the system pressure by the amount
adding 5 m strait pipe. considering a 52 m pump truck has 10 bent
pipes, and the pressure loss of hydraulic system itself could be as
high as 50 bar, and the reverse mechanism also cause pressure loss,
therefore control pump pressure appropriately, the whole pipe
pressure should be kept under 100 bar. Moreover, considering
the vibration of concrete pump and the friction of pipes, lower pipe
pressure could prolong the pipes’ using life, the whole pipe pres-
sure drop should not be greater than 100–150 bar, thus pipe pres-
sure drop for 10 m pipe should be less than 10 bar under the
working condition of 44 m3/h pumping volume. So we deduce
the suitable yield stress is no more than 1500 Pa and the suitable
viscosity is no more than 45 Pa s, and thus draw the work box con-
strained by the fluidity as shown in Fig. 13.
 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275 271

Table 1
Proportion variables.

Mix number W/B FA/B (%) S/A FDN/B (%) Mass (kg/m3)
Cement FA Water Sand Gravel FDN
C20a1 0.4 20 0.4 1.5 283 71 142 735 1102 5.31
C20a2 0.45 20 0.4 1.5 274 68 154 735 1102 5.13
C20a3 0.5 20 0.4 1.5 264 66 166 735 1102 4.95
C20a4 0.55 20 0.4 1.5 256 64 176 735 1102 4.8
C20a5 0.6 20 0.4 1.5 248 62 186 735 1102 4.6
C20b1 0.45 20 0.35 1.5 274 68 154 643 1194 5.13
C20b2 0.45 20 0.4 1.5 274 68 154 734 1103 5.13
C20b3 0.45 20 0.45 1.5 274 68 154 827 1010 5.13
C20b4 0.45 20 0.5 1.5 274 68 154 918 919 5.13
C20b5 0.45 20 0.55 1.5 274 68 154 1010 827 5.13
C20c1 0.5 10 0.4 1.5 297 33 166 735 1102 4.95
C20c2 0.5 20 0.4 1.5 264 66 166 735 1102 4.95
C20c3 0.5 30 0.4 1.5 231 99 166 735 1102 4.95
C20c4 0.5 40 0.4 1.5 198 132 166 735 1102 4.95
C20c5 0.5 60 0.4 1.5 132 198 166 735 1102 4.95
C20d1 0.45 20 0.5 0.005 274 68 154 918 919 1.71
C20d2 0.45 20 0.5 0.01 274 68 154 918 919 3.42
C20d3 0.45 20 0.5 0.015 274 68 154 918 919 5.13
C20d4 0.45 20 0.5 0.02 274 68 154 918 919 6.84
C20d5 0.45 20 0.5 0.025 274 68 154 918 919 8.55
C30a1 0.36 20 0.45 1.20 308 77 138 821 1004 4.61
C30a2 0.39 20 0.45 1.20 301 75 147 821 1004 4.52
C30a3 0.42 20 0.45 1.20 295 74 155 821 1004 4.42
C30a4 0.45 20 0.45 1.20 289 72 162 821 1004 4.33
C30a5 0.48 20 0.45 1.20 283 71 170 821 1004 4.24
C30a6 0.51 20 0.45 1.20 277 69 177 821 1004 4.16
C30a7 0.54 20 0.45 1.20 272 68 183 821 1004 4.08
C30a8 0.57 20 0.45 1.20 266 67 190 821 1004 4.00
C30a9 0.6 20 0.45 1.20 262 65 196 821 1004 3.92
C30b1 0.45 20 0.39 1.20 289 72 162 712 1113 4.33
C30b2 0.45 20 0.42 1.20 289 72 162 767 1059 4.33
C30b3 0.45 20 0.45 1.20 289 72 162 821 1004 4.33
C30b4 0.45 20 0.48 1.20 289 72 162 876 949 4.33
C30b5 0.45 20 0.51 1.20 289 72 162 931 894 4.33
C30b6 0.45 20 0.54 1.20 289 72 162 986 840 4.33
C30b7 0.45 20 0.57 1.20 289 72 162 1040 785 4.33
C30b8 0.45 20 0.6 1.20 289 72 162 1095 730 4.33
C30b9 0.45 20 0.63 1.20 289 72 162 1150 675 4.33
C30c1 0.45 10 0.45 1.20 325 36 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c2 0.45 15 0.45 1.20 307 54 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c3 0.45 20 0.45 1.20 289 72 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c4 0.45 25 0.45 1.20 271 90 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c5 0.45 30 0.45 1.20 252 108 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c6 0.45 35 0.45 1.20 234 126 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c7 0.45 40 0.45 1.20 216 144 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c8 0.45 45 0.45 1.20 198 162 162 821 1004 4.33
C30c9 0.45 50 0.45 1.20 180 180 162 821 1004 4.33
C30d1 0.45 20 0.45 0.30 289 72 162 821 1004 1.08
C30d2 0.45 20 0.45 0.60 289 72 162 821 1004 2.16
C30d3 0.45 20 0.45 0.90 289 72 162 821 1004 3.25
C30d4 0.45 20 0.45 1.20 289 72 162 821 1004 4.33
C30d5 0.45 20 0.45 1.50 289 72 162 821 1004 5.41
C30d6 0.45 20 0.45 1.80 289 72 162 821 1004 6.49
C30d7 0.45 20 0.45 2.10 289 72 162 821 1004 7.57
C30d8 0.45 20 0.45 2.40 289 72 162 821 1004 8.66
C30d9 0.45 20 0.45 2.70 289 72 162 821 1004 9.74

3.1.2. Rheology and bleeding resistance
Bleeding resistance was measured by the amount of bleeding
water on the surface of concrete. When the bleeding parameter B
is not bigger than 1 for 30 min, there could not see obviously bleed
on the surface of the sample. There seems no definite relation be-
tween the yield stress and bleeding, while the bleeding abates
obviously with the decreasing of viscosity as shown in Figs. 14
and 15. Higher viscosity reflects better reaction between water
and binder and stronger agglutination, hence to bleed, the water
need to overcome higher friction from the chunks of concrete, so
the bleeding abates. Enhancing fly ash can enhance the viscosity
since the additive could participate in the hydration reaction of sil-
icates [13]. As shown in Fig. 16, we can delineate a bleeding resis-
tance box in the rheological parameters by choosing concrete
which have B under 1: the appropriate parameters for good bleed-
ing resistance is the yield stress ranging from 280 Pa to 2000 Pa,
and the viscosity ranging from 11 Pa s to 43 Pa s.
3.1.3. Rheology and segregation resistance
Fig. 17 shows the forces exerting on the gravels in concrete, the
gravity pulls the gravels down, which is resisted by mortar, finally
equilibrium is reached to form the aggregates distribution, this is
the process of segregation. A recent paper form Roussel et al. has
studied the aggregate migration patterns during fluid concrete
castings and the aggregates’ distribution relating to the rheology
parameters [14]. The speed of gravel’s going down is very slow
272 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275

Fig. 10. 3000 ml Sample sketch map and photo.

Fig. 13. Fluidity work box.

Fig. 11. The pipe pressure loss with yield stress.

Fig. 12. The pipe pressure loss with viscosity. Fig. 14. The bleeding rate with yield stress.

300 Pa to 2000 Pa, and the viscosity ranging from 3 Pa s to

so the viscosity’s impact on the segregation is not obvious. On the
other hand, as segregation is the result that stone’s gravity over-
comes the shearing stress of the mortar at very slow velocity, the
segregation is dominated by the yield stress, as reflected in Figs. 18
and 19.
The segregation parameter V is used to evaluate the degree of
segregation, a larger V indicates more segregation of the aggre-
gates. When V is lower than 1.1, the concrete would not see appar-
ently segregation, segregation can be considered as negligible and
the concrete has good segregation resistance. The concrete with
good segregation resistance have the yield stress ranging from
43 Pa s as shown in Fig. 20.
Collectively considering the fluidity, bleeding resistance and
segregation resistance, the appropriate parameters can be deter-
mined as the yield stress ranging from 300 Pa to 1500 Pa and the
viscosity ranging from 11 Pa s to 43 Pa s. This method of evaluating
workability by using the rheological parameters is quick and
convenient.
3.2. Relationships of rheology and proportions
The next objective is to find how the component proportion af-
fects workability, in each aspect, as well as the whole situation. Let
 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275
Fig. 15. The bleeding rate with viscosity.
Fig. 16. Bleeding resistance work box.
Fig. 17. Gravel force undergoing.
Fig. 18. The segregation parameter with yield stress.
us first consider the change of the water-to-binder ratio (W/B for
the C20a series and C30a series). In Figs. 21 and 22, when the
273
Fig. 19. The segregation parameter with viscosity.
Fig. 20. Segregation resistance work box.
Fig. 21. W/B and the yield stress.
W/B ratio rises, both the yield stress and viscosity decrease, mean-
ing increase of the fluidity. However, the bleeding test indicates
that higher W/B ratio will lead to higher bleeding and segregation.
Cement is a basic proportion in concrete binder, and the major
constituent of binder. Theoretically, higher cement proportion is
positive for concrete workability because it enhances the cohesion
of concrete and ensures the fluidity. But taking the cost into
consideration, cement proportion should be in an appropriate
scope. In concrete, water is used to produce the hydration reaction
of silicates. Higher water-to-binder ratio mixture has more free
water and, naturally, with lower viscosity and yield stress the
fluidity is improved. However, when there is excessive free water
that the mortar is unable to keep, water will bleed through the
chunks of the mixture and the thin concrete tend to segregate.
Secondly, let us consider the change of the sand-to-aggregates
ratio (S/A) in the range from 0.35 to 0.63 (the C20b series and
274 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275

Fig. 22. W/B and the viscosity. Fig. 24. S/A and the viscosity.

Fig. 23. S/A and the yield stress. Fig. 25. FA/B and the yield stress.

C30b series) with the same mass of binder. In Figs. 23 and 24, as
the S/A ratio changes from 0.35 to 0.63, the yield stresses generally
grows and the viscosity increases, which indicates better blending
of the mixture and that coarse aggregates are better enwrapped by
sand, which makes the mixture more stable. But when the S/A ratio
is too high, like that of 0.5, the inside friction of mixture is aggran-
dized and the yield stress increases considerably, in this situation
the abrasion to the pipe may be too strong. If increasing the S/A ra-
tio to 0.55, the admixture will be too inattentive to assure the
strength.
Keeping the same mass of binder, we tested the fly-ash propor-
tion from 10% to 60% to replace cement (the C20c series and C30c
series). Figs. 25 and 26 show that adding fly ash simply reduces the
yield stress for C20 concrete, but for C30 concrete the yield stress
increases when the fly-ash ratio increases from 10% to 35% and
drops afterwards; this happens because the cement types for C20
and C30 are different. 30% to 40% fly ash increases the viscosity
and cohesion, but too much fly ash decreases the viscosity and Fig. 26. FA/B and the viscosity.
cohesion. We can see that fly ash as an additive helps increase
the fluidity of concrete. Using fly ash to replace cement can effec-
tively ameliorate the uniformity because the contact areas of pow- It is well known that water reducer could increase the fluidity of
der with powder, powder with water and powder with aggregate concrete. As in Figs. 27 and 28, we tested the concrete by adding
are larger, which make the proportions cohere better. Fly ash par- 0.5–2.5% water reducer (the C20d series and C30d series). Having
ticipating in the chemical reactions can reduce the humidity of comb-like molecular structure to smooth the interior molecular
reactions in case of uneven distributed solidification that nega- structure of mortar, water reducer could obviously reduce the yield
tively impacts concrete’s strengthen. However, adding too much stress and increase the fluidity while bring no effects on viscosity.
fly ash decreases the cement, the cohesion becomes bad, bleeding When adding low rate (1–2%) water reducer, a little raise of water
and segregation may take place. reducer could increase the fluidity considerably, but when the rate
 H. Xie et al. / Construction and Building Materials 44 (2013) 267–275 275

4. Conclusions

This paper introduces a convenient and quick method to opti-

mize workability of pumping concrete by using the workability
box. In which by measuring two rheological parameters the whole
aspect of workability could be judged. The yield stress and viscos-
ity are then used as a media to connect the workability and the
concrete’s component proportions. From the workability con-
straint of the yield stress from 300 Pa to 1500 Pa and the viscosity
from 11 Pa s to 43 Pa s, the corresponding ranges of proportions
are determined for good workability. For different cements materi-
als, the proportion ranges may be allowed to somewhat changes,
but the general relations of the rheology, proportion and workabil-
ity as established in this paper are expected to apply. Although the
theoretical circular pipe pressure drop formula Eq. (5) and accu-
rately value of bleeding and segregation parameters need further
study, the way of combining rheology and workability together
Fig. 27. FDN/B and the yield stress.
for concrete proportion design and optimization is feasible.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to offer their gratitude to the Na-

tional Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.
51275451); National Key Basic Research Program (973 pro-
gram) (Grant No. 2013CB035400); National Science and Tech-
nology Support Program (Grant No. 2011BAK03B09); National
High-tech R&D Program of China (863 Program) (Grant No.
2009AA044901).

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