DETERMINATION OF THE COMPRESSIVE STRENGTH OF CONCRETE FROM BINARY CEMENT, TERNARY FINE AND COARSE AGGREGATES

Abstract

Material reuse is one of the most active research areas embraced by a lot of disciplines including civil engineering. Various ceramics wastes from construction and demolition site, and manufacturing processes are dumped away into the environment, resulting into pollution that threatens both agriculture and public health. Therefore, utilization of the ceramic waste in construction industries would help to protect the environment. This thesis presents the findings of an experimental investigation of the effect of partial replacement of coarse aggregates, fine aggregates, and ordinary Portland cement with ceramic waste (calcined, fine and crushed ceramics) at percentage levels of 0%, 5%, 10%, and 20%; and the evaluation of strength property of the concrete produced from the combination of the constituents with optimum strength. Tests were carried out to assess the compressive strength properties of these concretes at 7, 28 and 56 days of curing. Compressive strength tests were conducted using 150 x 150 x 150 mm cube specimens. The results of tests showed that compressive strength of the concrete decreased with increase in ceramic waste content present in the concrete. Thus, for concrete produced from partial replacement of ordinary Portland cement with calcined ceramics (C - C), at 5% replacement (C – C5), the compressive strength was 16.6 N/mm2 and at 20% replacement (C – C20) the compressive strength was 13.4N/mm2. Similarly, for concrete produced from partial replacement of river sand with fine ceramics (F - C), the compressive strength were 13.8 N/mm2 and 10.9 N/mm2 respectively for 5% (F - C5) and 20% (F - C20) replacements. Partial replacement of granite with crushed ceramics in concrete (G - C), gave a compressive strength of 11.6 N/mm2 and 9.7 N/mm2 respectively for 5% (G - C5) and 20% (G - C20) replacements. For concrete produced from partial replacement of stone dust with fine ceramics (S - C), the compressive strength were 19.6 N/mm2 and 18.10 N/mm2 respectively for 5% and 20% replacements. For concrete produced from partial replacement of bush gravel with crush ceramics (B - C), the compressive strength obtained were 10.9 N/mm2 and 8.98N/mm2 respectively for 5% and 20% replacements. Finally, the concrete produced from the optimal combination of the binary cement, ternary fine and coarse aggregate gave a compressive strength of 22.20N/mm2 which is higher than the compressive strength of the control mix at 18.10 N/mm2. The result of the ANOVA carried out showed that the compressive strength obtained for each partial replacement of various constituents is statistically significant at 5% (i.e. α = 0.05) i.e. the change in the compressive strength of concrete produced is as a result of the presence of ceramics waste