Studies on self-curing self-compacting concretes containing zeolite admixture

Abstract

The process of infrastructural advancements resulting in development of any sub-continent primarily depends on the construction activities which facilitates safe and sustainable buildings for livelihood and high-quality transportation networks. Out of all the construction materials used concrete plays a major role. Hence, field engineers are posed with various challenges in maintaining the quality of concrete. Moreover, the attempt to reduce the use of cement content in concrete requires the utilization of mineral admixtures. The present work focuses to study the performance of self-curing self-compacting high-performance concretes containing calcined and uncalcined zeolite with polyethylene glycol (PEG) as self-curing agent. Two sets of concretes were formulated for investigations, the first set consists of 5 concrete mix proportions with control concrete and self-curing concrete's replacing cement with 5% of calcined and uncalcined zeolite containing 1% and 2% of PEG in both. The second set of concretes were formulated to replace 10% of cement content with calcined and uncalcined zeolite containing 1% and 2% of PEG in both. A relative comparison of the performance characteristics were evaluated by determining the mechanical and durability characteristics of proposed self-curing self-compacting concretes.