PROPERTIES OF CEMENT PASTE AND CONCRETE CONTAINING CALCIUM CARBIDE WASTE AS ADDITIVE

Abstract

This paper assessed the effect of calcium carbide waste (CCW) as additive on the properties of cement paste and concrete. The CCW used was sourced from a local panel beating workshop. It was sundried and sieved through a 75 µm sieve and characterized by X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) analytical method. The consistency, setting times and drying linear shrinkage of cement paste with CCW addition of 0, 0.25, 0.5, 0.75 and 1.0 %, respectively by weight of cement were investigated in accordance with standard procedures. The slump values of fresh concrete containing CCW as additive and of 1:2:4 mix ratio and water-cement ratio of 0.5 was determined. A total of sixty numbers of 150 mm cubes of hardened concrete were tested for compressive strength at 1, 3, 7, 28 and 56 days of curing in accordance with standard procedures. The concrete compressive strength was also modeled using Minitab statistical software based on linear regression technique. The results of the investigations showed that CCW was predominantly of calcium oxide (95.69 %) and a combined SiO₂, Al₂O₃ and Fe₂O₃ content of 3.14 %. The addition of CCW in cement decreased drying shrinkage (100 %), initial setting time (78 %) and final setting time (57 %), but increased consistency (14 %) at 1.0 % CCW content. The addition of CCW in concrete also showed slight increase in slump (6.5 %) and increase in compressive strength with increase in CCW additive up to 0.5 % and decrease in compressive strength with further increase in CCW content. The 28 days compressive strength of concrete with 0.5 % CCW content was 6.4 % more than normal, while that of concrete with 1.0 % CCW content was 14.9 % less than normal. The compressive strength model of CCW-concrete was developed with R² value of 0.830 and could be used to predict concrete compressive strength.

http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/njt.v36i1.4