• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.109-116
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• 2017

This paper describes the investigation into the durability alkali-activated materials(AAM) mortar and paste samples manufactured using fly-ash(FA) and ground granulated blast furnace slag(GGBFS) exposed to a sulfate environment with different GGBFS replace ratios(30, 50 and 100%), sodium silicate modules($Ms[SiO_2/Na_2O]$ 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0). The tests involved immersions into 10% sodium sulfate solution($Na_2SO_4$), 10% magnesium sulfate solution($MgSO_4$), 10% magnesium nitrate solution($Mg(NO_3)_2$) and 5% magnesium nitrate($Mg(NO_3)_2$+5% sodium sulfate solution+$Na_2SO_4$). The evolution of compressive strength, weight, length expansion and microstructural observation such as x-ray diffraction were studied. As a results, in case of immersed in $Na_2SO_4$, $Mg(NO_3)_2$ and $Mg(NO_3)_2+Na_2SO_4$ shows increase in long-term strength. However, for samples immersed in $MgSO_4$, the general observation was that the compressive strength decreased after immersion. The most drastic reduction of compressive strength and expansion of weight and length occurred when GGBFS or Ms ratios were higher. Also, the XRD analysis of samples immersed in magnesium sulfate indicated that expansion of AAM caused by gypsum($CaSO_4{\cdot}2H_2O$) and brucite(MgOH). The results showed that, an additional condition $Mg^{2+}$ in which ${SO_4}^{2-}$ is the presence of a certain concentration, sulfate erosion has to be accelerated.