Strength and durability of fiber reinforced concrete with partial replacement of cement by Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag

Concrete is a widely used construction material all over the world, with approximately six billion tons has been delivered every year. In the production of cement clinker, approximately one ton of CO2 has been released for one ton of cement. Cement use must be reduced by using substitute products to minimise CO2 emissions. To reduce the pollution and economy of construction industry cement is replaced by by-products to enhance its strength parameters. Our research work deals with the study of mechanical and durability properties of concrete. To assess the efficiency of Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag (GGBS) as a partial substitute for cement and to improve the tensile and flexural strengths and serviceability of concrete, all tests are carried out according to Indian standard codes. Various concrete mixes were planned with partial replacement of cement by GGBS in different proportions (0%, 20%, 40%, 60% and 80%) for a cement content of 400 kg/m3, with W/B ratio of 0.5, and steel fibers having an aspect ratio of 60 with three volume fractions (0.5%, 1% and 1.5%) .At the ages of 28, 90, and 180 days, concrete specimens were cast and investigations were carried out to determine the strength variations of concrete with and without fibers. Durability studies like water absorption, sorptivity, Rapid Chloride ion Penetration Test (RCPT) were done on GGBS concrete without fibers at 28 and 180 days. By replacing of cement with GGBS in concrete upto 40% increases the compressive strength of concrete by about 5-20%. Steel fibres increase the split tensile and flexural strength of concrete by considerable amount. A significant increase of split tensile flexural strengths of Steel Fiber Reinforced Concrete (SFRC) which ranged from 19 to 65% and 18-74% respectively, increase in strength was compared with conventional concrete without fibers of 28 to 180 days. A remarkable reduction has been observed in RCPT, sorptivity, and water absorption values when the cement was partially replaced by GGBS at 80% than conventional concrete. (c) 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the International Conference on Sustainable materials, Manufacturing and Renewable Technologies 2021.