Short-Term Study on Mechanical and Fresh properties of Micro-silica based Self Consolidating Concrete in Nigeria

The ever increasing environmental challenge arising from improper waste management has been a great concern to researchers and the society. One of such industrial waste is micro silica; a bye-product of the Carbothermic reduction of high purity quartz at temperature of about 2000oC in the presence of coke. The finess of this material and its pozollanic nature makes it suitable for use in the production of self-compacting concrete. In this research micro silica was introduced in percentages of, 5, 10 and 15% as partial replacement of cement in the production of self-compacting concrete. The fresh properties were examined using slump flow, T50cm, slump flow, V-funnel and blockage ratio using L-Box. As the Micro silica were introduced, T50cm time increased, Slump flow reduced, V-funnel flow time increased and L-Box value reduced, due to increase in viscosity. Comparing the experimental results with European Federation of National Associations of Representing for Concrete EFNARC 2002, blockage ratio for 15% was below 0.8. The compressive stresses at 28days were higher than the control at 28days compressive stress with 8.6%, 19.04% and 11.9% for 5%, 10% and 15% respectively. Thus, cement can be partially substituted with micro silica up to 15% with improvement in compressive strength in self-compacting concrete.