A Survey of High Performance Concrete Developments in Civil Engineering Field

High Performance concrete (HPC) has received increased attention in the development of infrastructure Viz., Buildings, Industrial Structures, Hydraulic Structures, Bridges and Highways etc. leading to utilization of large quantity of concrete. This paper presents a comprehensive coverage of High Performance concrete developments in civil engineering field. It highlights the High Performance concrete features and requirements over conventional concrete. Furthermore, recent trends with regard to High Performance Concrete development in this area are explored. This paper also includes effect of Mineral and Chemical Admixtures used to improve performance of concrete.


Introduction
Concrete is the most widely used construction material in India with annual consumption exceeding 100 million cubic metres.Conventional Ordinary Portland Cement Concrete which is designed on the basis of compressive strength does not meet many functional requirements as it is found deficit in aggressive environments, time of construction, energy absorption capacity, repair and retrofitting jobs etc.So, there is a need to design High Performance Concrete which is far superior to conventional concrete as the Ingredients of High Performance Concrete contribute most efficiently to the various properties.A High Performance Concrete is a concrete in which certain characteristics are developed for a particular application and environment so that it will give excellent performance in the structure in which it will be placed, in the environment to which it will be exposed, and with the loads to which it will be subjected during its design life [1].
High Performance Concrete is also defined as concrete which meets special performance and uniformity requirements that cannot be always achieved routinely by using conventional materials and normal mixing, placing and curing practices [2].The requirements may involve enhancement of placement and compaction without segregation, long term mechanical properties, early age strength, volume stability or service life in severe environments.The ingredients generally used in investigations are 1) Cement; 2) Fine Aggregate; 3) Coarse Aggregate; 4) Water; 5) Mineral Admixtures; and 6) Chemical Admixtures .

Admixture Applications in High Performance Concrete
Admixtures play an important role in the production of High Performance Concrete.Mineral Admixtures form an essential part of the High Performance Concrete mix.They are used for various purposes depending upon their properties.Table 1 shows different types of mineral admixtures with their particle characteristics.Chemical composition determines the role of mineral admixtures in enhancing properties of concrete.Different materials with Pozzolanic properties such as Fly Ash (FA), Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag (GGBS), Silica fume (SF), High Reactivity Metakaolin (HRM), Rice Husk Ash (RHA), Copper Slag, Fine Ground Ceramics have been

Experimental Investigations on High
Performance Concrete and in Sea Waters.The investigation indicated that the concrete mix containing 15% natural pozzolan, and 15% silica fume showed the best protection in sulphates solutions and sea waters by retaining more than 65% of its Compressive strength after one year of storage.High Performance concrete two way slabs cast with M 60 grade concrete with W/C ratio 0.32% and 7.5% silica fume exhibit good strength than RCC slab [3].High Performance reinforced concrete columns were manufactured at various replacement levels of silica fume (0%, 5%, 7.5%, and 10%) and flyash (10%) with superplasticizer CERAPLAST 300 and W/B ratio 0.3 to target a mean strength of M 60 .The cube compressive strength results at 3 days, 7 days, 28 days, 56days and 90 days indicated that maximum strength was obtained with 5% SF and 10% FA at all ages [4].The effect of 4 solution on the compressive strength of HPC mixes was checked by Shakir A. Al-Mishhadani et al. [5].Results of destructive and non-destructive tests were statistically

Air entraining admixture
To entrain small air bubbles in concrete which act as rollers thus improving the workability and therefore very effective in freeze-thaw cycles as they provide a cushioning effect on the expanding water in the concreting in cold climate analyzed by using SPSS verson15 software and statistical models were proposed to evaluate compressive strength, splitting tensile strength, modulus of rupture and static modulus of elasticity.High Performance Concrete mixes containing different percentages of metakaolin were tested for strength and durability and have shown better resistances to the attacks of chemicals such as chloride and sulphates when exposed to these chemicals for 180 days period [6].Durability in terms of Chloride ion permeability was measured for metakaolin based High Performance Concrete [7].Bhanja et al. [8] developed silica fume based high Performance Concrete mixes and found significant improvements in the tensile strength.Durability factor at the end of 30 freezing and thawing cycle of High Performance Concrete samples were examined [9].Rhelogical properties of High Performance Concrete mixes produced by rice husk ash and fly ash were studied and found that for low yield stress and moderate plastic viscosity, blending of equal masses of silica fume and rice husk ash seems to be a suitable admixture [10] [17] evaluated the elastic modulus of high performance concrete made from mixes using various percentages of fly ash, silica fume and granulated blast furnace slag.The effect of curing methods namely air-dry curing, curing compound and wet curing with burlap on the elastic modulus was also studied.An experimental work was carried out regarding the basic physical characteristics, mechanical and fracture-mechanics properties, durability charecteristics, hydric and thermal properties of high performance concrete with upto 60% of Portland cement replaced by fine ground ceramics [18].K. E. Hassan et al. [19] carried laboratory study on the properties of superplasticised high performance concrete by using SF and FA (10%, 30% by weight of cement).The SF concrete showed similar strength development to that of the Ordinary Portland Cement concrete but slight higher values at all tested ages (1, 3, 7, 28, 365 days).FA concrete gave lowest compressive strength at early ages, same at 28 days and higher at 365 days than OPC concrete.SF and FA reduced the permeability by 87% and 84% respectively in the long term (365 days).A study was carried out on the properties of Portland cement concrete (PCC), High volume fly ash concrete (HFAC, containing 40% of FA) and concrete (GGFAC, containing a combination of 25% FA and 15% GGBS) by assessing compressive strength and resistance to H 2 SO 4 attack.The compressive strength of GGFAC increased by 23.3%, higher than that of PCC, but lower than that of HFAC between 28 days and 1 year.The compressive strength of GGFAC and HFAC increased with increasing immersion period in H 2 SO 4 solution.The combination of FA and GGBS improved both short and long term properties of concrete, while HFAC requires a relatively longer time to get its beneficial effect [20].Abhilash Shukla et al. [21] evaluated the optimum percentage (0%, 5%, 10%, 15%, and 20%) of Rice Husk Ash as a partial replacement of cement for M 30 and M 60 grade of concrete.There was a significant improvement in compressive strength (3% to 10% increase) and flexural strength (0.6% to 8% increase) of the concrete with rice husk content of 10% for M 30 and M 60 grade concrete at 7 days and 28 days.By using linear regression technique M. F. Zain et al. [22] suggested formulae that relate splitting tensile strength with that of compressive strength, W/B ratio and concrete age for High Performance Concrete.The STS values obtained from experiment compared well with that estimated from this formula, with the average ratio of the experimental/predicted data being close to unity and proposed to be used to estimate the STS of High Performance Concrete.The effect of coarse aggregate type (crushed quartzite, crushed granite, lime stone and marble) on the compressive strength, splitting tensile strength, fracture energy, characteristic length and elastic modulus of concrete produced with 28 days target compressive strengths of 30 (W/B = 0.55), 60 (W/B = 0.44) and 90 MPa (W/B = 0.26) was studied [23] and found that for all grades crushed quartzite coarse aggregates concrete showed higher compressive strength (44.8  showed that partial cement replacement upto 20% had produced higher compressive strengths than control concretes for all W/B ratios.An experimental investigation on the flexural behaviour of reinforced high performance concrete was conducted by Paramsivam suresh kumar et al. [47] by using crushed sand stone as fine and coarse aggregates in addition with silica fume and fly ash combined with superplasticizer.The beams were made with concrete having compressive strength in the range of 74 -88 N/mm 2 and tensile reinforcement in the range of 1.34% to 3.14%.The ultimate experimental moment was found to be 3% -15% higher than predicted ultimate moment by ACI 318, actual deflections of the beams were found slightly above allowable values under service loads & observed crack widths under service loads were within acceptable limits.Effect of kerosene and Gasoline on some properties of high performance concrete (W/B = 0.31) which can be used as storage tanks for petroleum products was checked by performing experimental work.Specimen exposed to Kerosene and Gasoline showed more weight loss and reduction in compressive strength at 7, 28 and 90 days [48].By using fractional factorial design concept, Salilkumar roy et al. [49] prepared sixteen mixes from a basic mix (cement:sand:aggregates:fly ash = 1:1.3:2.6:0.8 with W/C = 0.37) and determined changes (cement = 0.1; sand = 0.1; aggregates = 0.2; fly ash = 0.4 and changing water cement ratio by 0.01) using Taguchi's orthogonal array.The changed composition mix was found to have highest compressive strength and lowest water absorption and therefore found to be best for making paving blocks.Flexural and Spliting tensile strengths of high performance fiber reinforced concrete were determined with variables fiber volume fraction (0%, 0.5%, 1%, 1.5% with an aspect of 80), silica fume replacement level (0%, 10%, 20%, 30%) and W/B ratio = 0.35.The addition of steel fibers upto 1.5% resulted in increase of 38% in the flexural tensile strength, and an increase of 56% in the splitting tensile strength compared with a plain concrete matrix [50].K. Arunachalam et al. [51] performed experiments to make a comparative study on the properties of high performance concrete (W/B = 0.28) with fly ash (25% and 50% replacement) and without fly ash (control concrete) in normal and aggressive environment (Al 2 SO 4 and NaCl).In case of control concrete under aggressive environment compressive strength was decreased from 28 to 60 days by about 25% of 28 days strength.There was a continuous increase in compressive strength from 7 days to 60 days for high performance fly ash concrete (both 25% and 50% cement replacement) for both environment.[56].The highest levels of strength and modulus of elasticity were obtained by silica fume concrete under water and wrapped curing at temperature of 35˚C.High Performance Concrete was produced by Andres Salas et al. [57] by using Rice Husk Ash samples (conventional type TRHA obtained by a thermal treatment and other chRHA was based on a chemical thermal attack to the rice husk ash).Compressive and Flexural Strengths of chRHA concrete were comparable to a silica fume concrete made with the same replacement level & these strengths were higher than the control and TRHA mixtures.Through the optimization of the proportions of compositions and employing heat treatment, very high performance concrete with large quantities of ultrafine mineral powders such as pulverized fly ash, pulverized granulated blast furnace slag and silica fume was successfully prepared which showed compressive strength upto 200 MPa [58].High Performance concrete utilizing fly ash and microsilica as cement replacing materials was investigated [59] to study permeation related properties like permeability, porosity and sorptivity with different curing conditions namely moist curing, air curing and curing at 5˚C.The permeability, porosity and sorptivity values were lowest for low W/B ratio with 10% microsilica and fly ash replacement in the range of 15% -20%.Same permeability values were not achieved for specimens cured at 5˚C in comparison with moist and air curing.The research was conducted [60] to obtain the optimum High Performance Concrete (W/B = 0.35) mix by using 10% silica fume and various percentages of pulvarized fly ash (40%, 60%, 80%) with melamine superplasticizer.The resistance of the produced concrete when exposed to an acidic environment (H 2 SO 4 , HCl) was reduced in mix with 10% silica fume and fly ash more than 60% as an OPC replacement.
Compressive strength of High Performance Concrete and Paste mixes was found by K. O. kjellsen et al. [61] at ages 1 day to 4 years with W/B ratio ranged from 0.25 to 0.4 and upto 10% of the cement was replaced by silica fume.The concretes and the pastes with 10% silica fume appeared to reduce strength between 3 and 9 months and were higher at 2 years than after 3 months.A mix design procedure for High Performance Concrete had been suggested by aminul Islam Laskar [45] which took rheological parameters into account to determine compressive strength, water cement ratio and aggregate volume to paste volume ratio.Instead of using water cement ratio and compressive strength relationship, relationship between compressive strength, paste volume-aggregate volume ratio; physical properties of aggregate and rheological parameters were used in mix design.Correlation charts for rheological parameters and compressive strength was developed based on cube test results of several trial mixes whose rheological parameters had also been found by the rheometer.Muhammad Fauzi Mohd.Zain et al. [46] developed prototype expert system called HPCMIX according to the mix design method proposed by Aitcin that gave proportion of trial mix of High Performance Concrete and recommendations on mix adjustment.Mehta and Aitcin [73] proposed a simplified mixture proportioning procedure that was applicable for normal weight concrete with compressive strength values between 60 and 120 MPa.This method was suitable for coarse aggregates having a maximum size of between 10 mm and 15 mm and slump values of between 200 and 250 mm.The optimum volume of aggregate was suggested to be 65% of the volume of the high performance concrete.

Conclusions
1) High Performance Concrete can be prepared to give optimized performance characteristics for a given loading and exposure conditions along with the requirements of cost, service life and durability.
2) The applications of concrete will necessitate the use of High Performance Concrete incorporating new generation chemical admixtures (PCE based superplasticizers) and available mineral admixtures.
3) The success of High Performance Concrete requires more attention on proper Mix Design, Production, Placing and Curing of Concrete.For each of these operations controlling parameters should be achieved by concrete producer for an environment that a structure has to face.

Table 1 . Different mineral admixtures used in HPC.
Such applications not only help to improve the strength and durability characteristics of High Performance Concrete but will also help to dispose more of the industrial by-products which are major environmental threats.Different Chemical admixtures (Super plasticizers) are extensively used in development of High Performance Concrete with very low water cement ratio are represented in Table2with their functions.

Table 2 . Different chemical admixtures used in HPC.
[44] the experimental trials it was observed that all the methods of mix design did not give desired workability and compressive strength and needed some modifications for making High Performance Concrete mixes.Kumbhar et al.[44]suggested following modifications for existing mix design methods to achieve High Performance Concretes. Indian Standard code method gives lesser proportion of fine aggregates so a proper coarse to fine aggregate ratio should be recommended for better workability of mix.Further, Indian Standard code method incorporates use of only one mineral admixture.There should be modification in method in terms of addition of more than one mineral admixture with appropriate proportion of chemical admixture. Department of Environment method suggests higher quantity of fine aggregate which increases water required and hence reduces the strength which is not acceptable for High Performance Concrete.Therefore proper dosage of Superplasticizer should be recommended. Modified American Concrete Institute method gives Copyright © 2013 SciRes.OJCE usage of High dosage of Superplasticizer to get high slump which reduces the strength therefore proper content of SP should be recommended.