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Utilization of recycled crumb rubber as fine

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Article in Construction and Building Materials May 2013
DOI: 10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2012.12.054

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Construction and Building Materials 42 (2013) 4852

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Utilization of recycled crumb rubber as ne aggregates in concrete mix design

Camille A. Issa , George Salem
Department of Civil Engineering, Lebanese American University, Lebanon

h i g h l i g h t s
" Good compressive strength results were recorded at rubber contents lower than 25% in replacement of crushed sand.
" Lower density ? lower weight. Up to 8% reduction in density was recorded at 25% rubber in substitution of crushed sand.
" Enhanced ductility of concrete advantageous for usage in highway barriers or other similar shock-resisting elements.
" Replacing more than 25% of ne aggregates with rubber crumb causes the compressive strength of concrete to drop extremely.
" Material is unpredictable, failure stress strain relationship does not follow a xed pattern in experiments at same point.

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 30 October 2012
Received in revised form 12 December 2012
Accepted 19 December 2012
Available online 9 February 2013
Keywords:
Recycled waste materials
Concrete
Rubber

a b s t r a c t
There is no doubt that the increasing piles of used tires create environmental concerns. As waste continues to accumulate and availability and capacity of landll spaces diminish, agencies are increasing application and use of recycled materials such as crumb rubber from tires in construction. The basic building
materials in concrete construction are primarily aggregate and cement. The educated use of recycled
materials can result in reduced cost potentials and may enhance performance; however, not all recycled
materials are well suited for concrete construction applications. The two main reasons for not utilizing a
reclaimed material are (1) addition of material is a detriment to performance, and (2) excessive cost. In
this study, the performance of recycled materials crumb rubber as valuable substitute for ne aggregates
ranging from 0% to 100% in replacement of crushed sand in concrete mixes is investigated. An acceptable
compressive strength was obtained with up to 25% by volume replacement of ne aggregates with crumb
rubber.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
A humongous amount of used rubber tires accumulate in the
world each year 275 million in the United States [1] and about
180 million in European Union [2]. Generally, the cheapest and
easiest way to decompose used tire is by burning them. However,
the pollution and enormous amount of smoke generated by this
method makes burning quite unacceptable and in some countries
it is prohibited by law. Thus, one of the most popular methods is
to pile used tires in landlls, as due to low density and poor degradation they cannot be buried in landlls (Fig. 1) [3]. These tires can
also be placed in a dump, or basically piled in a large hole in the
ground. However these dumps serve as a great breeding ground
for mosquitoes and due to the fact that mosquitoes are responsible
for the spread of many diseases, this becomes a dangerous health
hazard [4]. In industry higher amounts of rubber tire waste can

Corresponding author.
E-mail address: cissa@lau.edu.lb (C.A. Issa).
0950-0618/$ - see front matter 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2012.12.054

be utilized as fuel, pigment soot, in bitumen pastes, roof and oor

covers, and for paving industry [2,5,6].
The main goal of this research is to nd means to dispose of the
crumb rubber by placement of the rubber in Portland cement concrete mix and still provide a nal product with good engineering
properties for certain specied engineering applications.

2. Crumb rubber (CR)

Crumb rubber (CR) is a commodity made by re-processing
(shredding) disposed automobile tires [7]. Shredding waste tires
and removing steel debris found in steel-belted tires generates
crumb rubber. There are three mechanical methods used to shred
apart these tires to CR: the crackermill, granulator, and micromill
methods. CR can also be manufactured through the cryogenation
method; this method involves fracturing the rubber after reducing
the temperature with liquid nitrogen. CR is ne rubber particles
ranging in size from 0.075-mm to no more than 4.75-mm. In the
concrete mix, CR constitutes a portion of the aggregate in the concrete mix.

49

C.A. Issa, G. Salem / Construction and Building Materials 42 (2013) 4852

Fig. 1. Used and scrap tires stockpiled in a typical landll setting.

3. Past research
Early studies by Eldin and Fedroff explored the effect of rubber
chips on the compressive and exural strength of CRC mixes [8,9].
Schimizze et al. suggested using tires in light-duty concrete pavements [10]. Biel and Lee experimented with a special cement (Magnesium Oxychloride type) for the purpose of enhancing the
bonding strength between rubber particles and cement [11]. Goulias and Ali employed the resonant frequency method to measure
the dynamics modulus of elasticity and Poissons ratio. They found
that using rubber particles would improve the engineering characteristics of concrete. Toutanjis study focused on replacing mineral
coarse aggregate with rubber tire chips [12]. Freezethaw durability of rubber concrete was investigated by Fedroff et al. [13]. Lee
and Moon investigated adding crumb rubber into latex concrete
[14]. Khatib and Bayomy proposed a compressive strength reduction model of concrete mixes with added rubber content [15].
Thong-On reported on the mechanical behavior of crumb rubber
cement mortar [16].
Similar work on mechanical evaluation of rubber concrete has
also been reported outside of the US. This included studies by Li
et al. in Hong Kong [17]; Hernandez-Olivares et al. in Spain provided Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) photos of rubber/cement interface, as well as the evaluation of complex modulus
[18]. Most of the studies previously mentioned were analytical
and/or laboratory based experimental work. The major ndings
were that rubber concrete would suffer a reduction in compressive
strength while it may increase ductility. Whether rubber concrete

is suitable for any practical application has remained to be

explored.
In the early 2000, a wave of pioneering effort to build rubber
concrete test sites was undertaken in Arizona [19]. Concrete designs of 11.9 kg up to 35.6 7 kg of crumb rubber per cubic meter
were used in the construction of different types of concrete slabs.
The building of these test slabs have provided very useful experience and the means to evaluate rsthand knowledge about mixing,
hauling, pumping, placing, nishing, and curing of crumb rubber
concrete. Laboratory evaluation tests included compressive
strength, thermal coefcient of expansion, fracture, shrinkage
cracking and microscopic matrix analysis. The main conclusion of
these experimental investigations can be summarized. Fully
replacing coarse aggregate (gravel) or ne aggregate (sand) with
rubber is not appropriate because the loss of strength is too severe.
However, with small portion of aggregates replaced, the loss in
compressive strength was not signicant. A research study by Khatib and Bayomy [15] and Schimizze et al. [10] suggested that rubber should not exceed 1720% of the total aggregate volume.
Experiments under the laboratory environments commonly presented that the use of rubber in the concrete cement mix reduced
drying shrinkage, brittleness, and elastic modulus, which might
improve the overall durability and serviceability of concrete
cement.
Some of the major barrier for the use of crumb rubber concrete
includes a large variation of concrete performance according to the
application method and ratio of rubber usage and sensitivity to
variations in concrete handling procedure [20]. In addition to these
barriers, there is the costly process of crumb rubber particle preparation from scrap tires.
4. Experimental study
4.1. Concrete mix design
4.1.1. Sieve analysis
The ingredients used in the concrete mix design were subjected to a sieve analysis to compare the gradation of the aggregates and to able to have a comprehensive few of what sort of particle size the mix contains. The result of the sieve
analysis for both conventional aggregates and crumb rubber aggregates are presented in Table 1. The plan for this study was to substitute all the ne aggregates
by their corresponding volume of rubber crumbs. But as shown in Table 1, the grading of the tire rubber crumbs seemed comparatively close to the grading of the
crushed sand. For this particular reason it was decided to replace the crushed sand
(in the ne aggregates) by the rubber that was procured at 15%, 25%, 50% and 100%
of total crushed sand volumes. Fig. 2 shows clearly how the grading of the tire
crumbs is most comparatively close to the grading of the crushed sand.
4.1.2. Mix design
The mix design used for this study is shown in Table 2. The proportions are given below in volumes. Worth mentioning here is that at all substitutions of crushed
sand by rubber crumbs, the replacement was done by volume and not by mass, but

Table 1
Sieve analysis for aggregates and crumb rubber.
Rounded values of % passing sieve
Sieve size or no.

100
3= 00

4
00

3/800
#4
#8
# 16
# 30
# 50
# 100
# 200

Coarse aggregates

Fine aggregates

Recommended crushed

AVG coarse
aggregate

AVG medium
aggregate

AVG natural
sand

AVG
crushed sand

sand values ASTM C33

AVG tire
rubber
tested

100
89
17
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
0.5

100
100
100
96
19
2
1
1
1
1
0.9

100
100
100
100
99
98
93
87
51
18
6.6

100
100
100
100
100
77
47
31
19
11
7

100
100
100
100
95100
80100
5085
2560
1030
210
0

100
100
98
97
92
84
53
28
7
0.7
0.1

50

C.A. Issa, G. Salem / Construction and Building Materials 42 (2013) 4852

Sieve Analysis Plots

1.2

Sieve Opening (in)

0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

0
-20

20

40

60

80

100

120

% Passing
AVG Coarse Agg

AVG Medium
AggAnalysis Plot
AVG Natural Sand
Figure 1: Sieve

AVG Crushed Sand

AVG Rubber Crumbs

Fig. 2. Grading of rubber crumb compared to the crushed sand.

Table 2
Concrete mix design.
Item in mix

Specic gravity (g/cc)

Volume (m3)

Cement
Natural sand
Crushed sand
Coarse aggregate
Medium aggregate
Water

3.15
2.62

0.111
0.126
0.189
0.263
0.142
0.171

2.67
1

C:S:G:W = 1:2.84:3.65:1.5 (by volume).

The substitution was made by volume, but the mass differed since rubber
crumbs are lighter than the crushed sand. Rubber crumbs have a density of
930 kg/m3 while crushed sand has a density of 2500 kg/m3. Table 4 summarizes
the volumes of rubber crumbs required at each experiment and the corresponding
weights.

4.2. Conductivity test

The conductivity test was performed in order to check if rubber, being a good
insulator, would play a good role in electrical/sound insulation when placed as tire
crumbs in Portland cement concrete. The test is simple and consists of holding the

for practicality purposes, the corresponding weights of the calculated volumes was
used while casting the cylinders. The adjusted mix design for a batch of 1 m3 is given below.
An admixture was added to the mix, as a super plasticizer. The quantity was
around 2.35 liters per m3. Each batch consisted of seven cylinders, thus the quantities were not measured according to 1 m3 but to a total of 0.03711 m3 with the volume of each cylinder being 0.0053 m3 .Thus the quantities required for each batch
were projected by simple mathematics as in Table 3.
The rubber content replacing the crushed sand is shown in Table 4.

Table 3
Mix proportions for each batch of seven cylinders.
Item

Volume (m3)

Mass (kg)

Cement
Natural sand
Crushed sand
Coarse aggregate
Medium aggregate
Water

0.0041
0.0047
0.0070
0.0097
0.0053
0.0063

12.95
12.2
18.3
26.0
14.0
6.3

Fig. 3. Testing of conductivity in typical concrete cylinder.

Table 5
Conductivity test result for the concrete cylinders.

Table 4
Percent of rubber crumbs replacing sand.
3

Rubber @

Volume (m )

Weight (kg)

0% of Crushed sand
15% of Crushed sand
25% of Crushed sand
50% of Crushed sand
100% of Crushed sand
100% of all F.A.

1.05E3
1.75E3
3.50E3
7.0E3
11.7E3

N/A
0.9765
1.63
3.255
6.51
10.88

Cylinder type

Recorded reading (ls)

No. 1

No. 2

No. 3

AVG

0%
15%
25%
50%
100%
Full F.A.

194
250
427
687
818
1039

195
283
410
638
977
1636

152
248
429
655
917

180
260
422
660
904
1338

51

C.A. Issa, G. Salem / Construction and Building Materials 42 (2013) 4852

Compressive Strength

300

Stress (kg/cm )

350

0% Rubber
15% Rubber
25% Rubber
50% Rubber
100% Rubber
Rubber "FA"

250
200
150
100
50
0
0

14

21

28

Days
Fig. 6. Compressive strength failure curves.
The results of the conductivity test are shown in Table 5.
It can be noted from the values above that, as expected, as the rubber content in
the concrete increases, time of travel increases and thus conductivity decreases,
thus creating better insulation properties. The conductivity test was only performed
on the specimens that were crushed on 28 days.

Fig. 4. The UTM experimental setup.

Table 6
Weight, compressive strength, and failure mode of the concrete cylinders.
Cylinder type

Weight (kg)

Compressive strength
(kg/cm2)

4.3. Compressive test

Failure mode

No. 1 No. 2 No. 3 No. 1 No. 2 No. 3 AVG No. 1 No. 2 No. 3
0% 7 Days
0% 28 Days
15% 7 Days
15% 28 Days
25% 7 Days
25% 28 Days
50% 7 Days
50% 28 Days
100% 7 Days
100% 28 Days
Full FA 7 Days
Full FA 28 Days

13.6

13.2

13.1

12.3

11.4

10.1

13.7

13.4

11.8

12.2

10.5

8.9

13.6

13.3

12.7

12.3

11.4

187
314
192
275
152
224
113
135
52
54
13
15

200
327
170
279
129
171
124
133
39
40

202
335
175
249
121
230
118
142
49
66

196
325
179
267
134
208
118
136
46
53
13
13

A total of 33 cylinders were tested using the UTM shown in Fig. 4. Some of the
cylinders were tested at 7 days and the rest were tested at 28 days. The results of
the compressive tests are summarized in Table 6 and displayed using a bar chart
(Fig. 5) and curves in Fig. 6.
Some obvious observations from these results are that increase in rubber content leads to decrease in the compressive strength and weight.

5. Conclusions
After studying the several test results of the different specimens
ranging in rubber content from 0% to 100% in replacement of
crushed sand in ne aggregates, the following conclusions are
deduced:
5.1. Advantages

Note: S = shear, C = crushing, and B = both C & S.

two poles of the conductivity meter, each on a side of the cylinder (Fig. 3) and read
the measured reading in micro-seconds. The reading is the time needed for the
wave to travel from one pole to the adjacent pole.

 Good compressive strength results were recorded at rubber

contents lower than 25% in replacement of crushed sand. Such
results encourage the usage of this concrete mix in non-structural applications such as blinding, curbstone, manholes.

AVG Compressive Strength (kg/cm2)

350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0

1
325

0% Rubber Content
15% Rubber Content

267

25% Rubber Content

208

50% Rubber Content

136

100% Rubber Content

53

100% Rubber Content ALL FA

13

Fig. 5. Bar chart of compressive strength vs. % rubber content.

52

C.A. Issa, G. Salem / Construction and Building Materials 42 (2013) 4852

 Lower density ? lower weight. Up to 8% reduction in density

was recorded at 25% rubber in substitution of crushed sand.
 Enhanced ductility of concrete, which could be positively interpreted if usage is in highway barriers or other similar shockresisting elements.
 Enhanced insulation properties, as proved by the conductivity
test.
 Enhanced damping properties, since rubber absorbs vibration to
a large extent.
 A simple arithmetic shows that in a country like Lebanon, all the
yearly refused tires could be easily incorporated in 72,000 m3 of
concrete. This could be a good solid waste management plan.

No: of tires refused in Lebanon yearly 2; 000; 000 estimated

Total weight 2; 000; 000 tires  4:5 kg=tire 9; 000; 000 kg s
25% of crushed sand in fine aggregate 125 kg=m3 of concrete
Total volume of concrete 9; 000; 000=125 72; 000 m3

5.2. Disadvantages
 Beyond 25% rubber content in replacement of crushed sand in
ne aggregates, compressive strength drops enormously such
that the usage in structural and non-structural elements
becomes excluded.
 Material seems to be unpredictable in failure, since stress vs.
strain does not follow a xed pattern in experiments at same
point.
 Rubber-lled concrete is not economic, since rubber crumbs are
expensive as compared to natural aggregates. Nevertheless,
high-cost would be justied for solving a big ecological problem
if properly managed.

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