Investigation of the Behaviour of Concrete Containing Waste Tire Crumb Rubber

Abstract

In the concrete preparation 70–80 % occupying natural aggregates like crushed rock and river sand, the most commonly used coarse and fine aggregate is likely become scarcer the it is today. Now construction people need the alternatives to natural aggregates. Therefore, finding alternatives to naturally available materials is important to sustaining construction industry. On other hand a large quantity of waste materials are being produced by various industries and the governments are seeking ways to reduce the problem of disposal and to control the health hazard from the accumulation of waste materials. Some of the waste materials, such as coal fly ash, bottom ash, glass granules, plastic granules, copper slag, and crushed rock dust were used in the concrete. So in such waste materials are used to modify the mechanical and durability properties of concrete so as to make it suitable for any situation, this would also additional benefits in terms of reduction in cost, energy savings, promoting ecological balance and conservation of natural resources. In this study, the production of concrete was obtained by partially replacing the fine aggregate with crumb rubber. The main advantages of crumb rubber utilization in concrete to give the lower density, higher impact and toughness resistance, enhanced ductility, and better sound insulation etc. Crumb rubber is made by shredding waste tires. In the shredding process the steel wires are removed from the discard tires. The crumb rubber particle size ranging from 0.075 mm to not exceeding 4.75 mm, similar to the fine aggregates. Experimental investigations were carried out to study the behaviour of concrete with and without crumb rubber. The replacement of crumb rubber contents varying 5–25 % of river sand by volume. The test results indicated that the addition of waste tire crumb rubber substitution increases, the density, compressive strength and static modulus of elasticity was decreased. At the same time the flexural strength was increased up to 15 % of crumb rubber replacement. The relationship between static modulus of elasticity and flexural strength with compressive strength of concrete with and without crumb rubber was analyzed and compared the experimental results with the empirically calculated values by using design codes.