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Article history: The compressive strength, free and restrained drying shrinkage and cracking resistance of concrete under
Received 15 March 2017 drying condition were investigated for ternary cementitious systems containing Portland cement, slag
Received in revised form 9 May 2017 and fly ash. The restrained shrinkage test (ring test) was carried out following ASTM C1581. The results
Accepted 10 May 2017
showed that the increased replacement level of slag or fly ash from 0 to 50% led to a gradual decrease in
Available online 25 May 2017
28d compressive strength of concrete. The free drying shrinkage increased with the increase of slag con-
tent, but reduced with the fly ash content. The cracking resistance was well related to the free drying
Keywords:
shrinkage of concrete, other factors such as strength also showed certain effects on cracking resistance
Compressive strength
Ternary cementitious system
of concrete. The cracking resistance of concrete was enhanced with the addition of fly ash while weak-
Free drying shrinkage ened with the slag replacement level up to 50%.
Restrained shrinkage Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Cracking resistance
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2017.05.113
0950-0618/Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
X. Hu et al. / Construction and Building Materials 149 (2017) 406–415 407
of cracking resistance of concrete. Based on the investigation on 2.2. Concrete mixture proportion and specimen preparation
different factors contributing to early age shrinkage cracking in
Ternary binder materials comprising of Portland cement, fly ash and slag were
concrete, Aly and Sanjayan [9] found that the influence of the ten- designed using a factorial design method as previously used in Ref. [18]. The mix
sile elastic modulus is a major consideration for early age cracking proportions of the binder materials are shown in Table 2 and projected in a ternary
of slag-blended concretes. diagram as shown in Fig. 1. Concrete mixtures with three different water-to-binder
Free drying shrinkage and restrained cracking resistance is very (w/b) ratios, as shown in Table 3, were prepared.
In this study, three components x1, x2 and x3 are defined as the percentage of
important for mechanical properties and durability of concrete.
Portland cement, fly ash and slag, and the sum of x1, x2 and x3 is 100%. Then the
Different SCMs such as slag, fly ash and silica fume have been used value of responses Y, including any mechanical and durability characteristics of
to decrease the drying shrinkage and enhance the cracking resis- ternary cementitious materials can be obtained as:
tance of concrete [10,11]. The drying shrinkage of cement-fly
Y ¼ b1 x1 þ b2 x2 þ b3 x3 þ b12 x1 x2 þ b13 x1 x3 þ b23 x2 x3 þ b123 x1 x2 x3
ash-silica fume ternary mortars was measured in the study of
Wongkeo et al. [12], the drying shrinkage of cement mortar with bi bij and bjj (i, j = 1, 2, 3) are coefficients to be estimated. Based on the equation
shown above and experimental results of 7 mixtures, the values of 7 coefficients b
100% Portland cement was higher than all of other groups. Hale
can be calculated by data fitting. Then the contour lines in ternary diagrams with dif-
et al. [13] investigated the drying shrinkage of concrete mixtures ferent characteristic parameters, such as compressive strength, drying shrinkage and
with ternary system cement-slag-fly ash and found that the cracking time were plotted. The software Surfer 8.0 was used for drawing.
shrinkage was decreased with slag addition while fly ash showed Concrete samples were prepared according to the mixture shown in Tables 2
no effects on the shrinkage of concrete. and 3. For compressive strength and drying shrinkage measurement, concrete
was cast in molds with the size of 75 mm 75 mm 285 mm. In addition, pre-
In 1958, Simplex-lattice Design was introduced by Scheffe [14], embedded probes were fixed at both ends of the specimen for drying shrinkage test.
on which many design methods were developed, such as simplex After casting, the specimens were covered with plastic films and stored in a stan-
centroid design and the extremeness vertex design. Factorial dard curing room at 20 °C and relative humidity higher than 98% for 24 h. After
design method, a method to correlate the compositions of ternary demolding, samples were moved to a drying room at 23 ± 2 °C and relative humid-
ity of 50 ± 4%.
composite cements with different performance of samples with
For restrained cracking measurements, fresh concrete was filled into the space
only seven batches of experiments [15], has been applied in study- between two concentric steel rings. The concrete samples without demolding were
ing hydration properties [16], strength [17], ASR expansions [18] cured at temperature of 20 ± 2 °C and relative humidity above 95% for one day. After
and chloride-ion permeability [19] for presenting the relationship that, the outer rings were removed and all samples with inner rings were moved to
between material properties and components in a global way a dry room with constant temperature (23 ± 2 °C) and relative humidity of
(50 ± 4%).
and optimization of cementitious materials composition. In the
study of Shi et al. [18], the efficiency of the factorial design method
2.3. Testing methods
was verified by comparing the experimental and predicted results,
and the results correlated very well. 2.3.1. Compressive strength
Slag and fly ash are two kinds of SCMs commonly applied in The compressive strength was tested 28 days after mixing with one day curing
civil engineering for partly replace Portland cement and improve in standard room and 27d of drying under condition of 23 ± 2 °C and relative
humidity 50 ± 4%. The compressive strength was tested on two opposite lateral side
the mechanical and durability performance of concrete structure
of samples and area of 75 mm 75 mm was pressed. Three samples were tested for
[20,21]. The influences of slag or fly ash on shrinkage and cracking each group and the average value was reported.
resistance have been widely studied, the reduction of compressive
strength from fly ash [22] and increase of drying shrinkage from 2.3.2. Free drying shrinkage
slag [23] were considered to increase the risk of concrete cracking In this study, drying shrinkage of concrete was measured according to method
when slag or fly ash was incorporated. The studies on how combi- described in ASTM C157-75. The length change of specimen was measured using
vertical comparator. Three specimens were prepared for each mixture. The initial
nation of slag and fly ash in cement concrete may affect the shrink-
length of specimens (L0) was measured two hours after the samples were
age and cracking resistance is of great interest for application of demolded. The length (Lt) was measured at 1, 3, 7, 14, 21 and 28 days after the ini-
industrial waste and enhancement of concrete structure perfor- tial measurements. The drying shrinkage of the concrete at age of t days (est) can be
mance. By applying factorial design method, the synergetic effects calculated as follows. The reported value for each mix is the average of three
measurements.
of slag and fly ash on shrinkage and cracking resistance of concrete
can be studied integratedly and provide some information about L0 Lt
est ¼ 100% ð1Þ
the determination and optimization of mixture proportion. L0
This paper studies the strength, drying shrinkage and cracking
resistance of concrete with cement-slag-fly ash ternary cementi- 2.3.3. Restrained shrinkage
tious materials. The single and synergetic influences of slag and The restrained shrinkage of concrete was measured according to ring test
fly ash on shrinkage and cracking resistance of concrete are dis- described in ASTM C1581. The mold for restrained cracking resistance measure-
ment are shown in Fig. 2 [24]. The outer ring of the steel mold has an inner diameter
cussed. The effects of strength and drying shrinkage on cracking
of 406 mm, while the inner ring has an outside diameter of 330 mm. The inner steel
resistance of concrete are also discussed. In the aid of factorial ring has a thickness of 13 mm with four strain gages mounted for strain measure-
designing method, optimal cementitious materials proportion for ment. The cracking time to the nearest 0.25 day of each specimen was determined
higher compressive strength and cracking resistance can be after the drying was initiated. The measurements were continued until the sharp
presented. change of the strain was observed.
Table 1
Chemical composition of cementitious materials (wt.%).
(C) Batch C (w/b = 0.4) with superplasticizer (D) Batch D (w/b = 0.3) with superplasticizer
Fig. 3. Compressive strength contours of different batches at 28 days (MPa).
samples under this extreme drying condition. These may decrease autogenous shrinkage development. The results of this study
the water content within samples and therefore increase the showed that the addition of slag didn’t present any obvious nega-
shrinkage, especially drying shrinkage. tive effects on compressive strength of concrete curing under dry-
Some previous studies [32,33] have shown that the chemical ing condition, while the shrinkage problem was more severe than
shrinkage caused by the reaction of slag was higher than that concrete without slag. The hydration rate and degree of fly ash was
caused by cement hydration. Moreover, the high reactivity of blast much lower than that of cement and slag and the hydration prod-
furnace slag promoted the formation of hydration products and ucts of cement are needed to activate the pozzolanic reaction of fly
410 X. Hu et al. / Construction and Building Materials 149 (2017) 406–415
450 450
400 1 400
1
2 2
350 350
Free shrinkage strain (10-6)
150 150
100 100
50 50
0 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Age (d) Age (d)
(A) Batch A (w/b = 0.5) (B) Batch B (w/b = 0.4)
450 450
400 1 400 1
2 2
350 3 350
Free shrinkage strain (10-6)
3
Free shrinkage strain (10-6)
4 4
300 300
5 5
250 6 6
250
7 7
200 200
150 150
100 100
50 50
0 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Age (d) Age (d)
(C) Batch C (w/b = 0.4) with superplasticizer (D) Batch D (w/b = 0.3) with superplasticizer
Fig. 4. Development of drying shrinkage with testing time.
ash. The replacement of fly ash to cement inhibited the hydration shrinkage, while that with 50% cement and 50% fly ash showed
reaction at the early age and decreased the autogenous shrinkage the lowest. However, the maximum shrinkage value in Fig. 5 (C)
of concrete caused by hydration reaction. Moreover, the refine- placed in the mixture point of 75% cement and 25% slag. When less
ment effects and pozzolanic reaction of fly ash at later curing time than 50% replacement, fly ash decreased the measured shrinkage
improved pore structure and resistance to shrinkage of concrete value. After that, the drying shrinkage slightly increased as the
[34]. The higher elasticity modulus of cement concrete incorpo- content of fly ash continuously increased. The results are in agree-
rated with fly ash also restrained the development of shrinkage ment with previous study [37]. Another important information
and significantly decreased the drying shrinkage [35]. which can be obtained from the contour plots is that the content
Comparing the results of batch B and C, the polycarboxylate of slag in cement-slag-fly ash system governs the total drying
superplasticizer obviously reduced the free drying shrinkage of shrinkage of samples. Fixing the slag content in contour plots,
concrete samples. The shrinkages of batch B samples were 20– the variation of cement and fly ash content showed almost no
30% higher than that of batch C, especially for the samples blended influences on the value of total drying shrinkage.
with slag. The reduction of drying shrinkage from the addition of
superplasticizer may be attributed to the fact that superplasticizer 3.3. Cracking resistance
is efficient in dispersing the cement pastes particles in water and
increasing hydration rate and leading to higher strength built up The strains vs. testing time curves obtained from the ring test
and resistance to drying shrinkage [36]. It can be seen from the experiment are shown in Fig. 6. The data acquisition was started
results that the superplasticizer used in this study was more effec- from shifting the samples into drying condition and taking off
tive to slag blended samples due to the higher hydration rate of the outer ring of the mold, in this study 1d after mixing. The slight
slag than fly ash at early curing age. expansion on the initial testing period of time may be the result of
From Fig. 5 (A), (B) and (D), it can be known that the mixture the early hydration heat and adaption of samples to environment
with 50% cement and 50% slag obtained the highest drying and testing equipment. After that, the strain developed and gradu-
X. Hu et al. / Construction and Building Materials 149 (2017) 406–415 411
(C) Batch C (w/b = 0.4) with superplasticizer (D) Batch D (w/b = 0.3) with superplasticizer
Fig. 5. Drying shrinkage contours of different batches at 28 days (106).
ally increased with testing time until a sudden change, which cor- employment of superplasticizer improved the workability of con-
responds to the cracking of concrete. After that, the strains of sam- crete and increased the modulus of elasticity value up to 30%
ples kept unchanged due to the formation of inner cracking. A [39]. The enhancement of stiffness decreased the rate of strain
comparison of free drying shrinkage and the restrained ring strain development, recorded as cracking strain rate, and then increased
showed that the restrained ring strain was less than the free drying the value of cracking strain [31]. The addition of slag and fly ash
shrinkage due to the restriction of steel ring to the development of seems to affect the cracking strain in different ways. Slag decreased
concrete shrinkage. The steel ring strain can be considered as the the cracking strain while it was increased with fly ash replacement.
portion of the free drying shrinkage occurring under the condition The flexibility of concrete was improved by fly ash while the addi-
of restriction. Lomboy et al. [38] comparatively analyzed the tion of slag made concrete more fragile.
shrinkage performance evaluated by prism length test, free and Based on the value of cracking strain enet (lm) measured by the
restrained ring tests. They found that the development trends of ring test, a general relation was applied to link the shrinkage strain
shrinkage strain were similar for these three methods. The shrink- value and curing age t (day), which can be also applied for the dry-
age strain rate from the results of free ring test was the highest, fol- ing shrinkage measured by length measurement [24].
lowed by the prism length test. The restrained ring test gave the
lowest value of shrinkage strain rate. pffiffi
enet ¼ a t þ k ð2Þ
The cracking strain at the sudden changing point was consid-
ered closely related to the cracking resistance of the concrete. It According to the formula above, a linear relation can be
is influenced by compressive strength, elasticity modulus and obtained between enet and square root of curing age, and the slope
creep properties of concretes. Comparing the cracking strain of of this linear relation a (lm/day1/2) was defined as shrinkage strain
concrete samples shown in Table 4, the decrease of w/b ratio rate. In ASTM C 1581, this method has been standardized to esti-
(batch A to B) tends to decrease the cracking strain of concrete mate the shrinkage performance and cracking resistance of ring
samples. The decrease in w/b ratio is mostly accompanied by the concrete samples. The development rate of stress calculated by this
increase of compressive strength and improvement of pore struc- method is also introduced in the standards.
ture, which may increase the ultimate cracking stress of concrete. The value of shrinkage strain rate in formula (2) was calculated
However, the weakened of stress relaxation effects from lower w/b according to the results of cracking resistance measurement (ring
ratio resulted into the decrease of cracking strain [31]. The use of test). From the results shown in Table 5, the shrinkage strain rate
superplasticizer in the samples of batch C and D significantly of different samples showed a totally different trend compare with
increased the cracking strain. It has been confirmed that the that of cracking strain shown in Table 4. The decrease of w/b ratio
412 X. Hu et al. / Construction and Building Materials 149 (2017) 406–415
40 40
20 20
4
-20 3 -20
-40 7 -40 3
-60 4 -60 6
-80 -80 5
5
-100 -100 2
-120 6 2 7
1 -120
-140 -140
-160 -160
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Age (d) Age (d)
(A) Batch A (w/b = 0.5) (B) Batch B (w/b = 0.4)
40 40
20 20
6
0 0
Steel ring strain (10-6)
Steel ring strain ( 10-6)
4 7
-20 -20
3 4
-40 -40 6
-60 7 5 -60
3
-80 -80 1
-100 -100
2
-120 -120 2
1
-140 -140 5
-160 -160
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Age (d) Age (d)
(C) Batch C (w/b = 0.4) with superplasticizer (D) Batch D (w/b = 0.4) with superplasticizer
Fig. 6. Steel ring strain of different batches with curing age under dry condition.
Table 4
Cracking strain of different concrete mixtures (106).
Batch 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
A 97.0 119.0 73.0 98.5 99.0 107.0 86.0
B 82.0 107.0 76.0 88.0 117.5 97.0 106.0
C 121.0 –* 90.0 80.0 113.0 102.0 112.0
D 157.0 107.0 124.0 130.0 138.0 124.0 129.0
*
The cracking time of this sample exceeded the testing time.
Table 5
Regressed a obtained by the steel ring method (106/day1/2).
Batch 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
A 20.1 16.6 21.2 21.5 20.1 13.9 21.0
B 28.7 28.1 22.0 28.5 27.1 24.4 32.2
C 19.2 14.1 18.3 15.6 19.6 11.7 19.8
D 22.8 19.5 20.8 19.4 17.6 17.4 19.1
from 0.5 to 0.4 significantly increased the strain rate of samples, therefore, for samples with lower strain rate, cracks have more
while the incorporation of superplasticizer slightly decreased the time to seek the least resistance path and showed higher cracking
value of shrinkage strain rate. Tongaroonsri and Tangtermsirikul strain. Mostly, the cracks of low strain rate samples were formed
[31] studied the influences of strain rate on cracking strain and within paste and interface between paste and coarse aggregate
found that the higher shrinkage strain rate resulted into lower and rougher fracture surfaces were obtained.
cracking strain due to the different fracture behavior of concrete. Generally, the cracking time of samples were adopted to esti-
The cracking velocity of concrete was increased with strain rate, mate the cracking resistance of concrete. Fig. 7 shows the contour
X. Hu et al. / Construction and Building Materials 149 (2017) 406–415 413
(C) Batch C (w/b = 0.4) with superplasticizer (D) Batch D (w/b = 0.3) with superplasticizer
plots of cracking time of concrete with different mix proportion. heat and increase of flexibility and creep of fly ash blended con-
The cracking time of concrete was almost linearly decreased with crete made the fly ash very attractive when considering both
the increase of slag content, while the addition of fly ash gradually shrinkage reduction and cracking resistance enhancement [41,43].
enhanced the cracking resistance of concrete when total replace- Superplasticizer, as a surfactant, is effective for the decrease of
ment level lower than 50%. The incorporation of superplasticizer internal surface tension of capillary pore and drying shrinkage of
and increase of w/b ratio both increased the cracking resistance the concrete. The addition of superplasticizer improved the work-
of samples. ability of cement-based materials and may improve the pore struc-
It can be summarized from many previous studies [40,41] that ture of concrete, which potentially lowers the risk of cracking [22].
many factors including free drying shrinkage, shrinkage develop- When comparing the 4 cracking contour plots in Fig. 7, it can be
ing rate, creep properties, elasticity modulus, testing method for seen that the distances between every two contour lines in Fig. 7
cracking resistance (free or restrained) and tensile strength all (A) and (B) were identical with each other. The influences of slag
had influences on cracking resistance of concrete. Among these, and fly ash on cracking resistance of concrete have not much to
the shrinkage properties were considered to be the most important do with the w/b ratio of materials. While for concrete with super-
factor controlling the cracking of concrete [35]. According to the plasticizer addition (batch C and D), the cracking performance of
results of drying shrinkage and cracking resistance, the samples samples was more sensitive. That is to say, slag and fly ash replace-
with 50% slag replacement showed higher shrinkage value and ment shows more influences on the cracking resistance of samples
shorter cracking time than any other samples. The addition of when superplasticizer is applied.
50% fly ash resulted in the lowest shrinkage value and longest time Theoretically, the higher the drying shrinkage value is, the ear-
before cracking. For slag blended samples, the formation of AFt at lier the concrete cracking initiates. When other factors are ignored,
early ages produced expansive stress and may lower the cracking the drying shrinkage and cracking resistance of concrete may be
risk [7]. However, the higher drying shrinkage strain and smaller reversely correlated. Fig. 8 shows the relationship between drying
creep coefficient [8] resulted into lower cracking resistance of slag shrinkage and cracking time of concrete samples in this study. The
blended concrete. Meanwhile, the lower tensile strength, compara- relationship between these two parameters was not that obvious
ble elasticity modulus and lower ultimate stress-strength ratio due to the effects of other factors. However, we can still see from
comparing to non-slag concrete also increase the risk of cracking the figure that the increase of free shrinkage decreased the crack-
[42]. Massive studies have shown that the decrease of hydration ing resistance of concrete. Under some condition, the improvement
414 X. Hu et al. / Construction and Building Materials 149 (2017) 406–415
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