Eco-Friendly and Cost-Effective Design of Concrete Pavement Using Used Foundry Sand and Tiles Dust

Abstract

Concrete is the most undisputable material being used in infrastructure development throughout the world. Natural sand is a prime material used for the preparation of concrete. Nowadays river erosion and other environmental issues have led to the scarcity of river sand. The reduction in the sources of natural sand and in the cost of concrete production has resulted in the increased need to find new alternative materials to replace river sand, so that excess river erosion is prevented and high strength concrete is obtained at lower cost. The aim of the study is to minimizes the cost and achieve sustainable development of concrete pavement. Cement, sand and aggregate are basic needs but the new alternative materials that is used foundry sand which is generated by metal casting industry and in the tiles industry, about 15%-30% production goes as waste, these are partially replaced by river sand. The fine aggregate has been replaced by used foundry sand accordingly in the range of 10%, 20%, 30%, 40% & 50% by weight and also same for tiles dust for M-20 grade concrete. Concrete mixtures are produced to make (6 in × 6 in × 6 in) cube for compressive strength test at 7, 14, 28 days and (4 in × 4 in × 20 in) beam for flexural strength test at 28 days curing period, tested and compared in terms of compressive and flexural strength with the conventional concrete. Maximum compressive and flexural strength are found for 20% replacement of used foundry sand (FA2) and for 10% replacement of tiles dust (TA1) with respect to the conventional concrete (A0). By using alternative materials, the strength of concrete was increased significantly and for showing cost effectiveness a concrete pavement from Talaimari MOR to Kalpona Cinema Hall was designed for 4500 commercial vehicles per day. The pavement thickness required for conventional concrete is 28 cm whereas the pavement thickness required for concrete FA2and TA1are 22 cm and 24 cm respectively. Since the thickness of pavement slab is reduced, the cost of pavement construction is reduced almost 22% and 15% for concrete FA2and concrete TA1respectively.