Investigation of impact behavior of innovative non-curing steel fiber geopolymer composites

Abstract

One of the most important factors influencing the performance of geopolymer composites is the curing temperature. The dependence of geopolymerization process on activator under high temperature is a drawback need to overcome and research. This study focuses on designing of the new and innovative geopolymer composites mixtures designs with an ambient non-curing periods and improving the capacity of this materials, particularly in terms of mechanical properties and impact resistance. Experiments were conducted to measure impact resistance based on ACI committee 544, as well as impact energy absorption, compressive strength, splitting tensile strength, and flexural strength. The experiments were carried out by using fly ash from 20% to 80%, slag from 40% to 60% to replace cement as a main binder, liquid/solid ratios of 0.7–0.8 and 0–1.5% of steel fiber. Comparing with cured-geopolymer composites, the compressive strength, splitting tensile strength, and flexural strength are improved of 18.63%, 30.14%, 10% and non-curing mixture could be applied widely in production and construction site. The liquid/solid material ratio of 0.8 and 1.5% of hooked end steel fiber contribute to the significant enhancement of geopolymer composites without curing. Besides, the experimental result was examined with analysis results using Ansys software showed good agreement with a slight and acceptable difference under 10%, confirming the numerical method can be used to predict test results with acceptable accuracy.