Durability studies on concrete with partial replacement of cement and fine aggregates by fly ash and tailing material

Commonly used concrete in general, consists of cement, fine aggregate, coarse aggregate and water. Natural river sand is the most commonly used material as fine aggregate in concrete. One of the important requirements of concrete is that it should be durable under certain conditions of exposure. The durability of concrete is defined as its ability to resist weathering action, chemical attack or any other process of deterioration. Durable concrete will retain its original form, quality and serviceability when exposed to its environment. Deterioration can occur in various forms such as alkali aggregate expansion, freeze-thaw expansion, salt scaling by de-icing salts, shrinkage, attack on the reinforcement due to carbonation, sulphate attack on exposure to ground water, sea water attack and corrosion caused by salts. Addition of admixtures may control these effects. In this paper, an attempt has been made to replace part of fine aggregate by tailing material and part of cement by fly ash to improve the durability of concrete. The various durability tests performed were chemical attack tests such as sulphate attack, chloride attack and acid attack test and water absorption test. The concrete blend with 35% Tailing Material (TM) in place of river sand and 20% Fly Ash (FA) in place of OPC, has exhibited higher durability characteristics.