Effect of polypropylene fibres on strength and durability performance of M-sand self compacting concrete

Abstract

AbstractThe durability of the self compacting concrete is one of the prominent areas of concern in recent years since it has become prevalent due to its ease of handling in the construction industries. However, there is a lack of detailed durability study of M-sand self compacting concrete with polypropylene fibres in the literature. In this paper, self compacting concrete made by Portland pozzolana cement with natural sand and M-sand, different percentages of volume fraction (0%, 0.1%, 0.15% and 0.2%) polypropylene fibres with M-sand is thoroughly investigated for fresh properties, hardened properties, drying shrinkage, water absorption, permeability, acid resistance and corrosion crack initiation time. Further, SEM analysis was carried out to know the effect of polypropylene fibre on the concrete microstructure. The results confirmed that the use of M-sand has improved the fresh, hardened and durability properties of the self compacted concrete than natural sand. Also, it is observed that the addition of polypropylene fibres has reduced the fresh properties of self compacted concrete. However, M-sand with 0.15% polypropylene fibres has slightly improved the strength of self compacting concrete, compression strength by 6.97%, split tensile by 8.68% and flexure strength by 3%. Further, it has reduced the drying shrinkage by 40%, water absorption by 30%, water penetration by 33.33%, and increased the chemical resistance, surface crack initiation period than the natural sand self compacting concrete. Finally, this study concludes that M-sand with 0.15% polypropylene fibres improves the durability of self compacting concrete by reducing effect from aggressive environments and in turn contributes to increased corrosion resistance of reinforcements embedded in concrete. Thus, the study supports the use of self compacting concrete with M-sand and optimum amount of polypropylene fibres to achieve required sustainability in terms of strength and durability.

Keywords

• compression strength
• durability
• flexural strength
• polypropylene fibre
• self compacting concrete