scholarly journals Alkali-Activated Slag/ Fly Ash Concrete: Mechanism, Properties, Hydration Product and Curing Temperature

Alkali-activated concrete (AAC) is mounting as a feasible alternative to OPC assimilated to reduce greenhouse gas emanated during the production of OPC. Use of pozzolana results in gel over-strengthening and fabricate less quantity of Ca(OH)2 which provide confrontation to concrete against hostile environment. (AAC) is potential due to inheriting the property of disbursing CO2 instantly from the composition. Contrastingly an option to ordinary Portland cement (OPC), keeping this fact in mind the goal to evacuate CO2 emits and beneficiate industrial by-products into building material have been taken into consideration. Production of alkali-activated cement emanates CO2 nearly 50-80% less than OPC. This paper is the general assessment of current report on the fresh and hardened properties of alkali-activated fly ash (AAF), alkali-activated slag (AAS), and alkali activated slag and fly ash (AASF) concrete. In the recent epoch, there has been a progression to blend slag with fly ash to fabricate ambient cured alkali-activated concrete. Along with that the factors like environmental friendliness, advanced studies and investigation are also mandatorily required on the alkali activated slag and fly ash concrete. In this way, the slag to fly ash proportion impacts the essential properties and practical design of AAC. This discusses and reports the issue in an intensive manner in the following sections. This will entail providing a good considerate of the following virtues like workability, compressive strength, tensile strength, durability issues, ambient and elevated-temperature curing of AAC which will improve further investigation to elaborate the correct test methods and to commercialize it.

Author(s):  
Robert James Thomas ◽  
Sulapha Peethamparan

Alkali-activated concrete is a rapidly emerging sustainable alternative to portland cement concrete. The compressive strength behavior of alkali-activated concrete has been reported by various studies to a limited extent, but these discussions have been based on minimal evidence. Furthermore, although it is known that specimen size has a distinct effect on the apparent compressive strength of concrete, this effect has yet to be modeled for alkali-activated concrete. This paper presents the results of a comprehensive study of the effects of curing condition (i.e., moist-cured at ambient temperature for 28 days or heat-cured at 50çC for 48 h) and specimen size on the compressive strength of sodium silicate–activated fly ash and slag cement concrete. The heat-cured strength of alkali-activated slag cement concrete was linearly related to the moist-cured strength; the former was about 5% greater than the latter. Heat curing also improved the strength of alkali-activated fly ash concrete, although the effect was greatly magnified for lower-strength mixtures and was much less significant at higher strengths. Existing size effect laws employed for portland cement concrete proved reasonably accurate in describing the effect of specimen size on the apparent strength of alkali-activated slag cement concrete. However, these existing models greatly underestimated the size effect in alkali-activated fly ash concrete; the authors suggest that this finding was the result of significant microcracking in the alkali-activated fly ash concrete.


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