Experimental investigation of strength characteristics of concrete reinforcement with neem powders

Abstract

Collapsibility is the major problem faced by every structural element in buildings. Several innovations are happening every year to prevent concrete failure for better stability of these structures. This study is focused on analysing the strength aspects by using Neem powders on the concrete reinforcement and strength performance of the Neem mixed concrete at various percentages such as 0%, 0.1%, 0.2%, 0.3%, 0.4%, and 0.5% with that of cement. Beam elements have been casted and tested using a Universal Tensile Testing machine. It was found that the Neem powder contained sample showed positive strength enhancement, and it showed excellent performance towards the strength of the concrete in terms of compressive and split tensile strength. The input process parameters are analysed using L18 orthogonal array for validating the impact of response outputs considered in this study. The findings show that the compressive strength of the concrete mixture keeps on increasing with the increase in neem powder percentage but the split tensile strength shows a maximum strength value of 3.536 MPa at 0.2% replacement of neem powder, 28 days curing in comparison with conventional concrete. ANOVA results show that the percentage contribution of factors is 77.19 % and 14.9 %, for curing days and percentage replacement of neem powder respectively. Thus, this type of neem powder mixed concrete structure can be used as a strength-enhancing agent in RC beam elements.