Eco-friendly concrete using by-products of Steel industry

Abstract

This paper outlines the method of preparation, testing procedure and salient results on the eco-friendly concrete that is manufactured using the waste products of steel industries and hydraulic lime. Tests are carried out in two phases. In the first phase of tests, the quantity optimization of raw materials like fly ash and hydraulic lime is made so as to get a best binding material that resembles the conventional binder, the cement. The optimum lime content is determined by testing mortar cubes prepared from lime, fly ash and ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS), mixed in different proportions. The amount of lime in the mixture of lime+ fly ash was varied as 20, 35, 50, 65, 80 and 100 percent. The conventional procedure followed to characterize the quality of cement is adopted in this phase of tests and best raw material composition was arrived at. In the second phase, concrete specimens were prepared with taking steel slag as coarse aggregate, GGBFS as fine aggregate and binder that is found to have best performance from the test of phase one. The compressive strength, flexural strength and tensile strength of specimens were determined adopting conventional testing procedure. The effect of curing period on strength was also studied and reported. The present study indicates that concrete having very high strength can be produced with the above mention waste products of steel industry and hydraulic lime.