Use of Copper Slag as a Replacement Material of Fine Aggregate in Fibre Reinforced Concrete

Abstract

Concrete is one of the most used materials in the construction industry and is being used all over the world because of the longer service life provided by the concrete structures as compared to other construction materials being used in the construction industry. However, the durability properties of the concrete need to be checked before using it under different weather conditions exposed to severe atmospheric conditions. There have been a lot of researches done on principle of replacing cement or fine-aggregates or coarse-aggregates in the concrete using different materials for investigating the different properties of concrete. The aim of replacing the basic constituents of concrete can be any either to utilize some waste material thereby decreasing its impact on the environment or to use some properties of the replacement materials which possess the properties alike to the basic constituents of concrete or it can be any other purpose of replacement. Most of the researches had been done on partial substitution of cement or fine-aggregates. The replacement to be done depends upon the properties of the materials to be replaced and the replacing material. Sometimes the materials are used as an addition to the basic constituents of concrete for improving some of the properties of concrete. For example, addition of fibres into the concrete is done for increasing the tensile strength and crack resistance of concrete. Depending upon the materials replaced or the extra materials added or the characteristics of concrete improved, the nomenclature of concrete is changed. The significant amount of work done in this research work involved assessing the different properties of concrete made with the replacement of fine-aggregate with copper slag up-to full replacement level with a constant level of steel fibres present in it. The different tests were conducted at different curing periods of 7, 28 & 56 days of curing period. It was found that the workability, durability and strength of concrete increases with the increase in the copper slag content. Also, the microstructure investigation of the concrete samples was carried out using SEM. Keywords: Hybrid concrete, Fine aggregate, Copper Slag, steel fibers, strength and durability properties.