Improvement, characterization and use of waste corn cob ash in cement-based materials

Abstract

This work investigates the development of waste corn cob ash as supplementary cement replacement materials. The study focused on the effects of heat treatment on chemical composition, physical properties and engineering properties of corn cob ash. The results suggest corn cob ash that was heat treated at 600°C for 4 h shows percentage of SiO2 + Al2O3 + Fe2O3 around 72%, which can be classified as Class N calcined natural pozzolan, as prescribed by ASTM C618. The X-ray diffraction patterns indicated that the amorphous silica phase increased with increasing calcining temperatures. The water requirement, initial setting time and final setting time of specimens increased with increasing replacement percentage of raw or treated corn cob ash. The morta cubes which used 20% of treated corn cob ash replaced cement showed 103% of the 28 days compressive strength as compared to reference samples. The corn cob ash that was treated at 600°C for 4 h samples shows slightly higher effectiveness for improving the splitting tensile strength and compressive strength of concrete when compared to the untreated corn cob ash.