Abstract
This paper presents a comprehensive evaluation on self-compacting (SC) mortars incorporating 0, 1, 3, and 5% alumina nanoparticles (NA) as well as 0% and 30% rice husk ash (RHA) used as Portland cement replacement. To evaluate the workability, mechanical, and durability performance of SC mortars incorporating NA and RHA, the fresh properties (slump flow diameter and V-funnel flow time), hardened properties (compressive strength, flexural strength, and ultrasonic pulse velocity), and durability properties (water absorption, rapid chloride permeability, and electrical resistivity) were determined. The results indicated that the addition of NA and RHA has negligible effect on the workability and water absorption rate of the SC mortars. However, significant compressive and flexural strength development was observed in the SC mortars treated with NA or the combination of NA and RHA. The introduction of RHA and NA also reduced the rapid chloride permeability and enhanced the electrical resistivity of the SC mortars significantly. It is concluded that the coexistence of 30% RHA and 3% NA as cement replacement in SC mortars can provide the best mechanical and durability performance.
Highlights
Self-compacting concrete (SCC) technology was introduced by Okamura in 1986 [1]
Domone and Jin [7] reported three main advantages for investigating SCC technologies in mortars: (1) the amount of aggregates in SCC is lower compared to normal concrete, and the mortar characteristics govern the properties of SCC, (2) the mortar properties are among the main controlling factors in the SCC mix design procedures, and (3) the procedure of testing mortars compared to concrete is more convenient
A comparison between the slump flow diameters and V-funnel flow times of SC mortars with and without rice husk ash (RHA) indicates that SC mortars with RHA are slightly more workable than the SC mortars without RHA. This could be due to the lower amounts of sand in the SC mortars containing RHA that resulted in a slightly higher workability level
Summary
Self-compacting concrete (SCC) technology was introduced by Okamura in 1986 [1]. Over the recent decades, the technology of SCC has been an attractive option for industry practitioners worldwide due to its various benefits [1,2,3,4,5,6]. According to the previous studies, in the binary mortars containing nanomaterials and RHA, 0–30% of RHA have been introduced as an effective range to improve the mechanical behaviour and durability properties of specimens [20,29,30]. This is novel work as utilizing both RHA and NA as ternary blend with ordinary Portland cement (OPC) not been studied before. In this research, distilled and tap water were respectively used for the characterization tests and for sample preparation studies according to the recommendation of some previous studies [43,44,45,46,47,48,49,50,51,52]
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