A New Method of Controlling Water in Self-Compacting Concrete Production

Author(s): Hai-Thong Ngo, Abdelhak Kaci, El-Hadj Kadri, Tien-Tung Ngo, Alain Trudel, Sylvie Lecrux
Paper category: Conference
Book Title: 8th International RILEM Symposium on Self-Compacting Concrete - SCC 2016
Editor: Kamal H. Khayat
ISBN: 978-2-35158-156-8
e-ISBN: 978-2-35158-157-5
Publisher: RILEM Publications SARL
Publication year: 2016
Pages: 265-274
Total Pages: 10
Language: English

Abstract: Online water control is one of the most important processes to improve self-compacting-concrete (SCC) production regularity. This control is generally implemented during the mixing process based on the stabilisation of mixing power measurement. However, as for concrete with admixtures, typical SCC mixture takes a certain amount of time to recognise the stabilisation of mixing power which is sometimes difficult to achieve due to the effects of admixtures on concrete workability. In addition, for very fluid concrete like SCC, when the concrete water content is high, the variation of the power measurement becomes very small; thus, the water measurement precision becomes insufficient. In order to improve the control process based on the mixing power measurement and optimise the mixing time, this research proposes a criterion to determine the stabilisation of power curves by using power fluctuation over time. The stabilisation time estimated by this criterion is tested for measuring the concrete water content through an experimental program consisting of 14 SCC truck mixer productions of different compositions produced at an industrial batching plant. The results show that the new processing method allows obtaining a ±3.6 L/m3 precision of water content measurement. Besides, the reduction in mixing time can be made by considering the stabilisation time of power curves as an appropriate mixing time for each concrete batch production.

Online publication: 2016
Publication Type: full_text
Public price (Euros): 0.00