New insights into the prehydration of cement and its mitigation

Julyan Stoian, Tandre Oey, Jeffrey Bullard, Jian Huang, Aditya Kumar, Magdalena Balonis, Judith Terrill, Narayanan Neithalath, Gaurav Sant

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

38 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Ordinary Portland cement (OPC) prehydrates during storage or handling in moist environments, forming hydration products on or near its particles' surfaces. Prehydration is known to reduce OPC reactivity, but the extent of prehydration has not yet been quantitatively linked to reaction rate and mechanical property changes. A series of experiments are performed to develop a better understanding of prehydration, by intentionally exposing an OPC powder to either water vapor or liquid water, to investigate the extent to which premature contact of OPC with water and other potential reactants in the liquid and/or vapor state(s) can induce differing surface modifications on the OPC grains. Original results obtained using isothermal calorimetry, thermogravimetric analysis and strength measurements are correlated to a prehydration index, which is defined for the first time. The addition of fine limestone to a mixture formed using prehydrated cement is shown to mitigate the detrimental effects of prehydration.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)94-103
JournalCement and Concrete Research
Volume70
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Apr 2015
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Keywords

  • hydration
  • kinetics
  • surface layer
  • prehydration
  • thermal analysis
  • adsorption

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