Experimental Investigation on Mechanical Properties of Flyash Concrete and Flyash Fiber Reinforced Concrete

The present Experimental investigation is to study the Mechanical Properties of the Fly ash concrete reinforced with steel fibers. The concrete composite comprises of steel fibers in different percentages and partial replacement of cement in different proportions. Steel fibers varied from 0%, 0.5%, 1% and 1.5% by weight of cement and replacement of fly ash varied from 0%, 10%, 20%, 30% and 40% by weight of cement. Specimens were tested for 28 days, 60 days and 90 days and behaviour of the flyash concrete, steel fiber reinforced concrete and fly ash concrete reinforced with steel fibers were studied. When the specimens were tested for 28 days strength, reduction in the Compressive strength, Split tensile strength and Flexural strength were observed, while the 90 days strength of the specimens were found to increase considerably. Based on the test results on control specimens, it was found that improvement in strength of concrete is achieved with a optimum steel fiber content of 1.5% and replacement of cement upto 30% by fly ash. The investigation programme included the determination of the optimum fiber content which can be provided in the concrete composites. Optimum fiber content was determined based on the Compressive strength, Split tensile strength, Flexural strength of the standard specimens. As the steel fiber percentage selected for our investigation is upto 1.5% by weight, it is suggested that this percentage may be increased to explore the possibility of using more steel fibers in fly ash concrete.