HIGH STRENGTH CONCRETES BASED ON THE CHOICE OF THE BEST PARTICLE SIZE DISTRIBUTION IN AGGREGATE

Abstract

The requirements of the modern (high-end) construction industry demand the development of new types of concrete of high, and especially very high strength and with significantly improved properties in terms of durability. They provide new possibilities in the field of concrete technology of high strength and performance. When designing the composition of high-strength concrete (HSC), a special attention should be paid to the particle size distribution of aggregates, which should be chosen so as to achieve an "optimal" packing of the aggregate grains. The maximum grain size has been reduced to 2 mm. The Funk-Dinger formula was used to calculate the particle size distribution, which also takes into account fine particles of mineral powder additives. CEM I 52.5R, pure quartz sand, quartz filler, silica fume, powerful superplasticizer and low water/binder ratio were chosen for making HSC. In total, five different concrete mixtures were made. The paper presents the results of testing important properties of hardened concrete at ages from 1 day to 90 days and statistical processing of the obtained test results.

Keywords

• high strength concretes
• aggregate particle size distribution
• compressive strength
• tensile strength