Properties of concretes produced with waste concrete aggregate

An environmentally friendly approach to the disposal of waste materials, a difficult issue to cope with in today's world, would only be possible through a useful recycling process. For this reason, we suggest that clearing the debris from destroyed buildings in such a way as to obtain waste concrete aggregates (WCA) to be reused in concrete production could well be a partial solution to environmental pollution. For this study, the physical and mechanical properties along with their freeze-thaw durability of concrete produced with WCAs were investigated and test results presented. While experimenting with fresh and hardened concrete, mixtures containing recycled concrete aggregates in amounts of 30%, 50%, 70%, and 100% were prepared. Afterward, these mixtures underwent freeze-thaw cycles. As a result, we found out that C16-quality concrete could be produced using less then 30% C14-quality WCA. Moreover, it was observed that the unit weight, workability, and durability of the concretes produced through WCA decreased in inverse proportion to their endurance for freeze-thaw cycle. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.