experimental study on ductile characteristics of light weight ferrocement beam under flexural loading

The main investigation in this research work is to maintain the eco-balance by preventing the open site dumping of the Ground Granulated Blast furnace slag (GGBFS), a by-product in the process of cement production is an industrial waste, causing environmental pollution and prevention of sand mining by the replacement of Slag for fine aggregates in ferrocement. Sand mining has led to the danger of river-course change and causing floods. This replacement has been found to improve the strength characteristics of ferrocement and also makes it lightweight. This not only helps in construction of multi storied structures but also found to maintain thermal comfort. The main investigation is regarding the percentage replacement of sand by GGBFS and reinforcing with meshes. Light weight ferrocement is a composite material consisting of cement-sand mortar (matrix) along with light weight fine aggregate (In this work foamed granulated blast furnace slag is employed as light weight fine aggregate) as a replacement of sand in some quantity reinforced with layers of small diameter wire meshes. The present work is concentrating on two major aspects, Effect of blast furnace slag on first crack and ultimate strength and Behavior of light weight ferrocement element under flexural loading. The first part of the present study has been focusing on the effect of ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS) on ultimate strength with replacement of slag by 0%, 10%, 20%, 30%, 40% and 50% and second part of the work focusing the behavior of Light weight ferrocement beam with increased load.