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Mechanical properties of gabbro aggregate concrete

Article  in  International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology · October 2018

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International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology (IJCIET)
Volume 9, Issue 10, October 2018, pp. 176–181, Article ID: IJCIET_09_10_018
Available online at http://www.iaeme.com/ijciet/issues.asp?JType=IJCIET&VType=9&IType=10
ISSN Print: 0976-6308 and ISSN Online: 0976-6316

© IAEME Publication Scopus Indexed

MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF GABBRO

AGGREGATE CONCRETE
Rasha Ali Al-Fatlawy
Assistant Lecturer, M.Sc. Degree in Geotechnical Engineering,
Civil Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, University of Kufa

Waseem Al-Baghdadi
Lecturer, M.Sc. Degree in Geotechnical Engineering,
Civil Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, University of Kufa

Qusay A. Jabal
Lecturer, M.Sc. Degree in Concrete Technology
Civil Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, University of Kufa

ABSTRACT
A lot of materials could be used as an admixture or even as an essential part of
concrete, the aim of this study is to use the Gabbro rocks as a fine and coarse
aggregate in concrete. The used Gabbro in study is obtained from waste black granite
(as it's locally named). Results showed a significant increase in compressive, tensile
and flexural strength when using Gabbro as fine and coarse aggregates, comparing
with normal aggregate concrete; compressive strength started to increase from 35.1
MPa for reference mixes up to 56.8 MPa for Gabbro concrete (GC) while flexural
strength increased significantly from 3.2 MPa for reference mix to 10.3 MPa to GC
concrete (221% increment).
Keywords: gabbro concrete, fine aggregate, coarse aggregate, compressive strength,
tensile, flexural
Cite this Article: Rasha Ali Al-Fatlawy, Waseem Al-Baghdadi and Qusay A. Jabal,
Mechanical Properties of Gabbro Aggregate Concrete, International Journal of Civil
Engineering and Technology, 9(10), 2018, pp. 176–181.
http://www.iaeme.com/IJCIET/issues.asp?JType=IJCIET&VType=9&IType=10

1. INTRODUCTION
Concrete is the most common construction material all over the world even when comparing
with steel, for example, which is less durable, less fire resistance and more expensive.
According to that, increasing the mechanical properties and enhancing the durability of the

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 Mechanical Properties of Gabbro Aggregate Concrete

concrete represents a highly priority for designers. Many researches were done to achieve
these goals even by using new material as admixtures or by using these new materials as
concrete aggregate itself. One of the most durable rocks is the Gabbro rock, the Gabbro rock
is igneous rocks having a grey or black color, its durability and scratch resistance were very
high. Moreover, the compressive strength was also very high (more than 280 MPa). The
Gabbro rock was used, as it is, as facing for buildings, paving, flooring and decoration [1,2].
On the other hand, the chemical structure of Gabbro contains several melted minerals
together forming very hard rock, it contains quartz, chromium, nickel, cobalt, gold, silver,
platinum and iron.
The priority of this investigation is to use the Gabbro as fine and coarse aggregate in
study, since the Gabbro is expensive, the use of waste Gabbro from local markets or
buildings reduce the overall cost of concrete.

2. EXPERIMENTAL WORK
2.1. MATERIALS
Ordinary Portland cement was used in all mixes, sand was used as fine aggregate from An
Najaf area / Iraq, and gravel with 16mm for maximum size were used in reference mixes,
tables 1 and 2 show the sieve analysis of coarse and fine aggregates which confirming Indian
standards IS-383 [3],
The Gabbro rocks used as a replacement from fine and coarse aggregates, it crushed in
laboratory to become a fine and coarse aggregate then used as aggregate replacement with
different ratios (10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, 50% finally reaching to 100%). reference mix
concrete ingredients shown in table 3, while figure 1 shows the gabbro fine and coarse
aggregates used in study.

2.2. SPECIMENS and MOULDS

Three specimens were used for each type of concrete mix to find the average value of all
mechanical properties. Compressive strength was done by using steel molds with dimensions
of 100×100×100mm. The fresh concrete was compacting using vibration table machine, the
moulds were opened after 24 hours, the specimens were curing in water for 28 days. Figure 2
shows the cubic concrete specimen under testing.

2.3. TESTING
Tensile strength test was done by using splitting tensile test for a steel cylinders with 100mm
in diameter and 200mm in height. Figure 3 shows the cylindrical concrete specimen under
testing. The value of tensile strength was calculated using equation no.1

Where:
ft: tensile strength of cylinder
P: maximum load (failure load) applied from machine
D: diameter of cylinder, and
L: height of cylinder

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 Rasha Ali Al-Fatlawy, Waseem Al-Baghdadi and Qusay A. Jabal

The flexural strength test was performed by using third point loading for a beams with
dimensions of 100×100×400mm. Figure 4 shows the concrete beam under testing for flexural
strength. The flexural strength value obtained from equation 2 shown:

Where:
fb: flexural strength of concrete
P: maximum load from machine.
L: length of beam.
b; width of beam, and
d: depth of beam

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

All the results of reference concrete (RC) and gabbro concrete (GC) with different ratio of
replacement for compressive, tensile and flexural concrete were summarized in table 4. The
compressive strength of was suddenly increased from 35.11 up to 40.39 MPa by just 10% of
aggregate replacement, then it is gradually increased while increasing the replacement ratio
until it finally reached to 56.82 MPa. this could be attributed to the strength of gabbro rocks
which have a very high values of compressive strength that exceed 200 MPa, hardness equal
to 7 and high durability [4,5], this high resistance properties were due to the existence of
course crystal grains which generated by heating several metals that crystallized underground
[6 ,7].
Both tensile strength and flexural strength were also significantly increased. The tensile
strength was increased by 32% with 10% replacement while the increasing percentages were
achieved more than 125% with 100% aggregate replacement ratio. Same pattern was noticed
with the flexural strength, the increasing percentages were 26% and 215% with the same
previously mentioned replacement ratios. The relationship between increasing percentages
with the aggregate replacement ratio is shown in figure (5). This behavior could be attributed
to two reasons; firstly, this type of aggregate gives, by its tough and rough texture, a very
good bond with cement paste which lead to create higher strength. The second reason is the
excellent properties of tensile and flexural strength of gabbro itself (as shown in table 5), it
have about 15-30 MPa tensile strength, and have flexural strength of about 10-20 MPa [8].

Table 1 Sieve Analysis of Course Aggregates Used in Study Confirm IS-383

Sieve Size, mm %passing by Weight %Passing Spec. (IS-383)
40 100 100
20 100 100
16 94.2 90-100
10 43.9 30-70
5 3.8 0-10

Table 2 Sieve Analysis of Fine Aggregate Confirm Zone 2

Sieve size %passing %passing spec. –IS-383-ZONE2
10 MM 100 100
5 mm 91.0 90-100
2.36 82.7 75-100
1.18 77.5 55-90
600 mic 44.1 35-59

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 Mechanical Properties of Gabbro Aggregate Concrete

300 mic 17.8 8-30

150 mic 4.2 0-10

Table 3 Reference Concrete Mix Ingredients for Each Cubic Meter of Concrete.
ingredient cement Fine agg. Coarse agg. water
Weight kg 495 745 935 218

Table 4 Mechanical Properties (MPa) of Concrete with different ratios of Gabbro Aggregate
Compressive Tensile
Replacement Ratio Flexural strength
strength strength
Reference mix (RC) (0%) 35.11 2.16 3.25
10% 40.39 2.85 4.10
20 % 42.89 3.10 5.16
30% 44.61 3.56 5.93
40% 46.49 3.78 6.71
50% 48.30 3.90 7.23
60% 49.88 4.23 8.00
70% 51. 43 4.41 8.77
80% 52.80 4.50 9.34
90% 54.72 4.67 10.02
100% 56.82 4.93 10.34

Table 5 Some Mechanical and Physical Properties of Gabbro [8]

Tensile Flexural
Compressive
Property Color Density (kg/m3) strength strength
strength (MPa)
(MPa) (MPa)
Dark grey to
Value 2810 – 3030 124 – 303 15 – 30 10 – 20
black

Figure 1 Gabbro Fine and Coarse Aggregates Figure 2 Compressive Strength Test for Gabbro-
Concrete (GC)

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 Rasha Ali Al-Fatlawy, Waseem Al-Baghdadi and Qusay A. Jabal

Figure 3 Tensile Strength Test for Gabbro-Concrete (GC)

Figure 4 Flexural Strength Test for Gabbro-Concrete (GC)

Figure 5 Relationship between Increasing Percentage and Aggregate Replacement Ratio

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 Mechanical Properties of Gabbro Aggregate Concrete

REFFERENCE
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/gabbro “Gabbro”, wkipedia ,the free encyclopedia, page last
edited on 6 November, 2017
[2] www.Rocks.comparenature.com /en/granite-vs-gabbro/comparison-1-14-0 , “ compare
rocks” ,copyright 2015-2018, A softUvista
[3] IS-383 ,”Indian Standards Specifications for Coarse and fine Aggregates from Natural
Sources for Concrete”, 2002.
[4] WWW.ROCKS.COMPARENATURE.COM/en/properties-of-model-14-6 ,”properties of
gabbro-physical ,thermal compare Rocks”,2018
[5] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/earth.sciences/impact/rocks/igneous/gabbro ,”earth sciences-Gabbro
“,university college, London ,2018.
[6] http://study.com/academy/lesson/gabbro-uese-facts.html “Gabbro: uses and facts”,2018.
[7] WWW.SOFTSCHOOLS.COM“Gabbro facts, http://www.softschools.com/facts/rocks
/gabbro-facts
[8] www.matweb.com/search/datasheettext.aspx?bassnum=bmin04 ,”Gabbro Mechanical and
physical properties “,2018.

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