Mechanical property of straw concrete brick with additives viscocrete

Abstract

The results of the straw brick research were carried out with normal material, which constantly shows low compressive strength, in that sense the viscocrete additives were used to improve the quality of straw brick. The objective of this research is to investigate the mechanical properties of concrete brick, namely: the compressive strength, specific gravity, and water absorption power. This research implemented experimental research method, which was conducted by using concrete bricks characteristically with 40 cm of width, 20 cm of height, and 10 cm of thickness, made from rice straws, cement, sand, water and viscocrete as the test sample. The mortars used in this research were basically made from cement, sand, water and viscocrete with the ratio of 1: 7: 0.8: 0.015. The concrete bricks were created by pressing the straws mixed with glue into straw, and then cut them according to the variants of the volume. The variations of straw volume were 0 m3; 0.000625 m3; 0.00075 m3; 0.00125 m3; 0.0015 m3; 0.001875 m3; and 0.00225 m3. There were five samples for each volume of straw. The test results obtained maximal compressive strength, density, and absorption in concrete bricks straw of 3.0852 MPa, 1749 kg/cm3, and 13,9828%, respectively. The results confirmed the Indonesia National Standard quality of concrete brick, acknowledged with SNI 03-0349-1989.