Composition of Concrete

Concrete is a Engineered Material with the combination of various materials. The traditional raw materials to make concrete are Cement, Fine Aggregates (Sand), Coarse Aggregates and Water but due to recent new trends in construction industry it is necessary to look beyond these traditional materials and add some additives to cater the demands of rapid growing construction industry demands. Additives can be Chemical Admixtures in the form of Plasticizers or Superplasticizers which are generally known as water reducers and Mineral Admixtures in the form of Fly Ash, Silica Fume, Metakaolin.

Concrete Composition can be divided into two phases.

Phase 1: Paste Phase

Phase 2: Aggregate Phase

Paste phase consists of Cement and Water where cement is the binding material in the entire concrete, it binds all the materials of concrete along with the help of water to get homogeneous, dense material. Mineral and Chemical Admixtures may also be included in paste phase. Paste phase constitutes around 20 to 40 percent of the volume of concrete.

Aggregate phase consists of Fine Aggregates and Coarse Aggregates which is the major mass of the concrete, since 60 to 80 percent of the volume of concrete is made up of aggregates it becomes necessary to select good quality of aggregates. Aggregates should have adequate strength and resistance to exposure conditions and should not contain deleterious materials which can have adverse effect on the properties of concrete.

Difference between Cement Paste, Cement Mortar, Cement Concrete.

• Cement paste is made up of Cement and Water
• Cement Mortar is made up of Cement, Fine Aggregates (Sand) and Water
• Cement Concrete is made up of Cement, Fine aggregates (Sand), Coarse Aggregates and Water

Concrete Specialist will design the appropriate concrete mix design to ensure all the ingredients are added in controlled manner to get the desired result from the concrete in terms of compressive strength, durability aspects and so on.