Authors

Abstract

The current study deals with obtaining the high performance mortars to use in the
applications of ferrocement. The main problem that has greatly affected the
performance of mortar is the workability. A low water-cement ratio mostly resulted in
increases in the compressive strength and led to the enhancement of durability
characteristics, but decreases in the workability.
Workability becomes an important factors, as the mortar has to easily penetrate
between the layers of the mesh wires. A reasonably workable with high strength
cement mortar can be obtained by using a high cement content coupled with the use
of silica fume and superplasticizers. In this investigation a series of compression tests
were conducted on 50 mm cube and 150 ×300 mm, cylindrical specimens to obtain
the compressive strength and the stress-strain behavior of mortar with silica fume and
superplasticizers and flexural tests were conducted on 50 ×5 0 × 200 mm prism to
obtain the modulus of rupture. The results of this study indicated that the variation in
mortar strength depend on the water-to-binder ratio of the mix and percentages of
cement replacing. The effects of these parameters on the stress-strain curves are
presented. The best replacement percentage of silica is 3% was concluded in this
study. From the experimental results a mathematical model has been developed to
predict the 28-day compressive strength of silica fume mortar with different water-tocementitious
ratios and superplasticizers percentage

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