Advanced materials management for Indian construction industry by application of statistical process control tools

Abstract

This paper aims at exploring the applications of advanced Statistical Process Control (SPC) tool like Cumulative Sum (CUSUM) with V-mask for monitoring of advanced materials of construction industry like Ready Mixed Concrete (RMC). Quality of concrete produced by commercial RMC batching plants of Delhi and Ahmedabad, India were monitored by the application of CUSUM with V-mask. Primarily the 28-day cube compressive strength of the concrete were monitored with this tool. Collection of primary data included the different types of the grades of concrete, mix-design for the concrete produced and also the production procedures of commercial batching plants. The proposed SPC tool was used to analyze and detect whether the results of the compressive strength of the concrete were within the target design strength. If the results obtained were unsatisfactory, then a root cause analysis was carried out to find out the cause of the problem. Results during the investigations carried out during the root cause analysis revealed that the RMC plants were using more cement to reduce the producers’ risk of producing a concrete which may be rejected by the consumer. Usage of higher cement content is a wastage of resource and also it creates shrinkage cracks. It has been expected that about INR 8 million to 9 million per year may the potential cost savings by application of CUSUM technique with V-mask for monitoring the quality of the RMC produced by the commercial RMC plants.