Characteristics of crushed and alternative fine aggregates based on flow, shear and impact behaviour

Abstract

Crushed sand has been found to be an excellent replacement for river sand as the latter is not readily available. As a part of sustainable construction methods and practices, industrial by- products such as copper slag, cinder etc., can be used as alternative sands. In this work, an attempt has been made to study the performance of crushed stone sand for its flow properties based on large sample analysis. For this, 30 samples of crushed sand were procured from different sources. In addition, few alternative sands were also considered for the analysis which included copper slag, Ennore sand and two types of cinders. The parameters tested are flow time based on New Zealand flow cone, loose bulk density, uncompacted voids and specific gravity. In order to enhance the performance of the poor crushed sand, different samples of crushed sands were blended which results in acceptable flow characteristics. Similar exercise was done for alternative sands by considering double or triple blending which finally resulted in good flow properties for possible use in concrete. In addition, few samples were also tested and evaluated for their shear and impact behaviour. Conclusions are drawn based on the results obtained.