Construction Technology and Site Management

Module 5

Special Concretes and concreting Techniques

INTRODUCTION
• The improvements in performance can be grouped as:
1. Better mechanical properties than that of conventional concrete, such as compressive
strength, tensile strength, impact toughness, etc.,
2. Better durability attained by means of increased chemical and freeze-thaw resistances.
3. Improvements in selected properties of interest, such as impermeability, adhesion, thermal
insulation, lightness, abrasion and skid resistance, etc.
• The mechanical properties can be improved by using one or more of the following
approaches:

1. Modifications in microstructure of the cement paste.

2. Reduction in overall porosity.
3. Improvements in the strength of aggregate-matrix interface.
4. Control of extent and propagation of cracks.

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LIGHTWEIGHT CONCRETE
• The conventional cement concrete is a heavy material having a density of 2400 kg/m². hd
high thermal conductivity. The dead weight of the structure made up of this concrete is
large compared to the imposed load to be carried, and a relatively small reduction in dead
weight, particularly for members in flexure, e.g. in Highrise buildings, can save money and
manpower considerably. The improvement in thermal insulation is of great significance to
the conservation of energy. The reduction in dead weight is normally achieved by cellular
construction, by entraining large quantities of air, by using no-fines concrete and
lightweight aggregates which are made lighter by introducing internal voids during the
manufacturing process.

• Lightweight aggregate is a relatively new material. For the same crushing strength, the
density of concrete made with such an aggregate can be as much as 35 per cent lower
than the normal weight concrete.

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Applications
• Different uses of lightweight (aerated) concrete can be summarized as follows:
1. As load bearing masonry walls using cellular concrete blocks.
2. As precast floor and roof panels in all types of buildings.
3. As a filler wall in the form of precast reinforced wall panels in multi-stored
buildings.
4. As partition walls in residential, institutional and industrial buildings.
5. As in-situ composite roof and floor slabs with reinforced concrete grid beams.
6. As precast composite wall or floor panels.
7. As insulation cladding to exterior walls of all types of buildings, particularly in
office and industrial buildings.

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ULTRA-LIGHTWEIGHT CONCRETE

• The ultra-lightweight concrete, with unit weights or densities ranging from

600 to 4000 kg/m³, is made from a mixture of cement, sand (omitted for
concrete having unit weight or density less than 600 kg/m³) and expanded-
polystyrene beads one to six millimeters in diameter.

• The conventional workability tests namely slump test, compacting factor

Wee-Bee test, and flow table test are unsuitable in case of expanded-
polystyrene rete Conventional techniques can be used for casting and
placing expanded-polyene concrete.

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VACUUM CONCRETE
• In concreting thin sections like slabs and walls, a fluid mix with water-
cement 0.50 to 0.65 is required to facilitate the placing and compaction.
Such a mix d to relatively low strength and poor abrasion resistance. In
such situation, he uum treatment of concrete, involving the removal of
excess water and air by ion can be helpful.
• The vacuum-processed concrete is extensively used for factory production
of precast plain and reinforced concrete units. The other important
application is in construction of horizontal and sloping concretes slabs,
such as floor slabs, road and airport pavements, thin load-bearing and
partition walls. Vacuum treatment can be effectively used in the resurfacing
and repair of road pavements.

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MASS CONCRETE

• The concrete placed in massive structures like dams, canal locks, bridge
pien, d can be termed mass concrete. A large-size aggregate (up to 150
mm maximum and a low slump (stiff consistency) are adopted to reduce
the quantity of cemen in the mix to about five bags per cubic meter of
mass concrete. The mix, heng relatively harsh and dry, requires power
vibrators of immersion type for compaction The concrete is generally
placed in open forms. Because of the large mass of concrete, the heat of
hydration may lead to a considerable rise of temperature.

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ROLLER-COMPACTED CONCRETE

• Roller compacted concrete (RCC) is a mixture of aggregates, cement with

or without supplementary cementing materials, water and in some cases
water-reducing admixture, proportioned to support external compaction
equipment. This stiff ( and lean), zero-slump concrete mixture has the
consistency of damp gravel. The low water content requires it to be mixed
in a continuous flow system, typically in a p mill mixer, spread with a
modified asphalt paver and compacted with a roller. The resulting product
is a construction material with the strength and characteristics of
conventional concrete.

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Construction of Roller Compacted Concrete Pavement (RCCP) RCC is
eight-batched continuous mixing mill normal mixer such used soil-cement
treated base asphalt concrete construction. The pavement initially
constructed in lifts of 150-200 mm for pavement thickness of more than 400
mm with an elapse time of 30 minutes hours between lifts.

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Limitations

• Unlike concrete pavement, RCCP surface is uneven as in the case of fe

pavement. It is therefore, necessary to add a wearing course several
centimeters thick made of bituminous concrete or, at least, a surface
treatment to provide a non finish for heavy traffic moving at high speeds.
Due to the fact that the RCC is hi sensitive to loss of strength, the
compaction has to be carried out energetically w a sufficient number of
passes of the rollers and that the densities required are to carefully
controlled.

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WASTE MATERIAL-BASED CONCRETE

• These co are primarily made up of handling, processing and

transportation. The stability and durability of products made of concrete
using waste materials over the expected life span is of utmost importance,
particularly in relation to building and structural applications. The forms in
which they are used are wide and varied: they may be used as a binder
material, as partial replacement of conventional Portland cement or
directly as aggregates in their natural or processed states.

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Industrial Wastes

• Some of the industrial by-product wastes can be profitably used in the

concrete construction industry which requires large quantities of low cost
raw materials. This utilization offers triple benefits, namely, conservation of
fast-declining natural resources, planned gainful exploitation of waste
materials and release of valuable land for more profitable use. The most
influential factor that dictates the utilization of industrial by-products is the
economic cost in comparison to the conventional materials that would
have been otherwise used. A brief description of waste by products is
given here.

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• Blast-furnace Slag Large quantities of slag are generated during the production of iron
and steel. Granulated or foamed or dense blast-furnace slag can be produced depending
on the rate and manner of cooling the molten slag. The granulated slag can he used in
the manufacture of slag cements, Blast-furnace slag cements contain slag up to 60 per
cent, hence there is considerable reduction in the rate of heat evolution and a significant
increase in the resistance to chemical attack.
• Coal Ash from Power Stations The main by-product is fly ash or pulverized fuel ash
which is the fine dust carried upward by combustion gases and collected in cyclones or
wet scrubbers, and electrostatic precipitators. The bulk ash which is greyish in color
becomes darker with increasing proportions of unburnt carbon. It is used as a cement
replacement.
• Silica-fume Concrete Silica-fume is a by-product of the reduction of high purity quartz
with coal in electric are furnaces in the production of ferro-silicon metal. Because of its
extreme fineness (about 200 00 000 mm /g) and high glass content, silica-fume is a very
efficient pozzolanic material, i.e., it is able to react efficiently with the hydration products of
Portland cement in concrete.

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Silica-fume in concrete can be used for the
following purposes:
1. To conserve cement

2. To produce ultra high strength concrete.

3. To control alkali-silica reaction

4. To reduce chloride associated corrosion and sulfate attack

5. To increase early age strength of fly ash/slag concrete

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SHOTCRETE OR GUNITING
• Shotcrete is mortar or very fine concrete deposited by jetting it with high van (pneumatically
projected or sprayed) on to a prepared surface as shown in Fig The system has different proprietary
names in different countries such as Blast Blow Crete, Gun Crete, Jet Crete, Nucrete, Pneukrete,
Spraycrete, Torkrete etc. Shotcrete offers advantages over conventional concrete in a variety of new
conflicte and repair t frequently more economical than conventional concrete because of lem
remork requirements, requiring only a small portable plast for mandschure and plement is capable
of excellent bonding with a number of materials and this may be a important consideration.

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Construction in Ferrocement

The construction in ferrocement can be divided into four phases: (1)

fabrication skeleton framing system, (ii) fixing of bars and mesh, (iii)
application of mora and (iv) curing. The quality of mortar and its application
is the most critical phase Mortar can be applied by hand or by shotcreting.
Since no formwork is requing as in conventional reinforced concrete
construction, ferrocement is suit especially for structures with curved
surfaces such as shells and other free-fom shapes.

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Applications

Due to the very high percentage of well distributed and

continuously running steel reinforcement, the ferrocement
behaves as steel plates. As discussed earlier, its cracking
resistance, ductility, impact and fatigue resistance are higher than
those of concrete. In addition, the impermeability of ferrocement
products is far superior to that of ordinary reinforced concrete
products.

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Introduction

The presence of microcracks at the mortar-aggregate interface is

responsible for the inherent weakness of plain concrete. The weakness can
be removed by inclusion of fibers in the mix. The fibers help to transfer loads
at the internal microcracks. Such a concrete is called fiber-reinforced
concrete. Thus the fiber-reinforced concrete is a composite material
essentially consisting of conventional concrete or mortar reinforced by fine
fibers.

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DIFFERENT TYPES OF FIBERS

• The most commonly used man-made fibers have been steel

and polypropylene, principally in concrete, and glass, principally
in cement mortar for thin section applications.

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POLYMER CONCRETE COMPOSITES (PCCS)

• Polymer concrete composites are obtained by the combined processing of polymeric

materials with some or all of the ingredients of the cement concrete composites
Depending on the process by which the polymeric materials are incorporated, polymer
concrete can be classified as follows.

• Polymer-Impregnated Concrete (PIC)

In polymer-impregnated concrete, low viscosity liquid monomers or prepolymers are

partially or completely impregnated into the pore systems of hardened cement composites
and are then polymerized. The partial or surface impregnation improves durability and
chemical resistance. Overall improvements in the structural properties are modest. On the
other hand, total or in-depth impregnation improves structural properties considerably.

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The applications of polymer impregnated
concrete are as follows:
1. Surface impregnation of bridge decks The aim of impregnating the bridge
decks is to render them impervious to the intrusion of moisture, deicing
chemicals and chloride ions.

2. Applications in irrigation structures The effect of cavitation and erosion in

dams and other hydraulic structures can be catastrophic. Conventional
repairs of the damage are expensive and huge losses may be caused due
to loss of benefits from irrigation, power generation, flood control, etc. In
such cases, the polymer impregnated treatment may be cost effective. The
concrete may be removed from the place of severe damage and the
damaged area patched, dried and treated by impregnation.

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Polymer Modified Concrete

Polymer modified concrete (PMC), more specifically called

polymer cement concr is a composite obtained by incorporating a
polymeric material into concrete during the mixing stage.
However, the polymer so added should not interfere with the
hydration process.

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• Resin or Polymer Concrete
• Polymer concrete is a composite wherein the polymer replaces
the cement-we matrix in the cement concrete. It is
manufactured in a manner similar to that of cement concrete.
• Prepolymer Cement Concrete (PCC)

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• GAP-GRADED CONCRETE
This type of concrete is obtained when a gap graded aggregate is used in
the "production of concrete. In case of gap grading certain undesirable sizes
of aggregates are omitted from the conventional continuous gradings.
• NO-FINES CONCRETE
As the name suggests, this concrete does not contain fine aggregate. The
chan aggregate particles have been found to possess a cement paste
coating of up to 13 mm around them. Hence no-fines concrete contains a
multitude of voids which a responsible for its low strength.

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NUCLEAR CONCRETE

• Due to its excellent characteristics for neutron and gamma-ray

attenuation, the case of construction and a relatively low initial
as well as maintenance costs, make concrete a most suitable
material for radiation shielding. The concrete primarily used for
radiation shielding may be called nuclear concrete.

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