Preliminary study on utilization of steel mill scale in concrete

Abstract

Modern society is witnessing rapid advancement in science and technology, which increases the natural resource demand. Due to these advancements, an extra burden comes on such resources. Due to this, an alternative approach requires to fulfill these demands. In the same context, concrete is one of the world's most widely used building materials. So, in present study aims to provide a sustainable alternative to one of the principal constituents of concrete, i.e., sand. Natural river sand is typically used as a fine aggregate in concrete. The water table is lowered due to the extraction of natural river sand from the river bed, posing another environmental concern. Thus, it is essential to find a substitute for river sand. The present study attempts to find an alternative in the form of the Steel Mill Scale (SMS), which is obtained as a byproduct of the Steel industry. For the study, the fine aggregate was replaced partially by the SMS in various weight-based proportions such as 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, and 25%. Super-plasticizers were added in varying amounts to keep the Constant workability. Due to its higher water absorption rate, SMS was used in surface-saturated dry condition. All concrete properties, including compressive strength, split tensile strength, flexural strength, density, abrasion resistance, water absorption, and porosity, were tested using M30-grade concrete. Strength tests were conducted at the age of 7, 28, and 56 days, while all the other tests were done at 28 days only. In addition to all of these, XRF was performed on SMS to know the different oxides present in the material. Due to iron availability in SMS, compressive strength results were desirable up to 15% replacement, and in split tensile strength increment was clearly visible up to 15% replacement. Based on the all results, 15% replacement gives an encouraging result.