Properties of fresh concrete incorporating a high volume of fly ash as partial fine sand replacement

The use of fly ash in concrete is very common nowadays, mainly as a partial replacement for cement. However, the amount actually used in many countries is only between 15 to 25 percent. Disposal of unusable fly ash raises severe ecological problems and is quite expensive, not to mention the difficulty of finding dumping sites. Increased utilization of fly ash is thus, in many countries, in the national interest. A research program was initiated on the utilization of large quantities of fly ash Class F of marginal-quality in concrete as partial fine-sand replacement. The present paper studies the effect of such replacement on the properties of fresh concrete. The mechanical properties of the hardened concrete will be presented in another paper. The workability of most fly-ash mixtures was better than that of the reference mix (without fly ash). The water requirement of the fly-ash mixtures was either the same, or higher by about 9 percent, as compared with the reference mix. The rate and volume of bleeding were rather similar for the fly ash and the reference mixes. However, a significant reduction in bleeding by the fly-ash was found in the concrete mixtures with the chemical admixtures water reducer and retarder and high-range water reducer. Setting was delayed by the fly-ash, but the additional delay, that beyond the effect of the chemical admixture proper, was much less in the mixtures with the water reducer and retarder and negligible in the mixtures with the high-range water reducer.