A Numerical Hydration Model to Predict the Macro and Micro Properties of Cement–Eggshell Powder Binary Blends

Abstract

This study aims to propose a hydration kinetic model for the cement–eggshell powder binary system and predict the performance development of composite concrete through this model. The specific content and results of the model are as follows. First, based on the cumulative hydration heat of the cement and eggshell powder binary system in the first seven days, the parameters of the cement hydration model and the eggshell powder nucleation parameter are calibrated. These parameters remain constant regardless of the mix ratio. Secondly, the hydration heat of the cement–eggshell powder binary system over 28 days is calculated using the hydration model. The results show that at 28 days, for specimens with 0%, 7.5%, and 15% eggshell powder substitution, the cement hydration degrees are 0.832, 0.882, and 0.923, respectively. The hydration heat per gram of cement is 402.69, 426.88, and 446.73 J/g cement, respectively, while the hydration heat per gram of binder is 402.69, 394.86, and 379.72 J/g binder, respectively. Additionally, the hydration model is used to calculate the chemically bound water and calcium hydroxide content of the cement–eggshell powder binary system. At 28 days, for samples with 0%, 7.5%, and 15% eggshell powder, the chemically bound water content is 0.191, 0.188, and 0.180 g/g binder, respectively, and the calcium hydroxide content is 0.183, 0.179, and 0.173 g/g binder, respectively. Finally, a power function is used to regress the calculated hydration heat with experimentally measured compressive strength and surface electrical resistivity. The correlation coefficients for compressive strength and surface electrical resistivity are 0.8474 and 0.9714, respectively. This is because the strength weak point effect of eggshell powder has minimal impact on hydration heat and surface electrical resistivity experiments but significantly affects the strength experiment.