Reactive powder concrete with the blastfurnace slag cement

The paper presents the results of tests of the reactive powder concrete [RPC] obtained from the CEM III/A 42.5 N LH/HSR/NA blast furnace slag cement, containing about 60 % of granulated blast furnace slag. The optimisation of the concrete mix composition, aimed at obtaining the largest particle packing in the composite, was carried out based on Funk’s optimal particle size distribution curve. A low water to binder ratio of 0.2 was obtained by using a superplasticiser based on polycarboxylates. It has been shown that it is possible to obtain, under normal conditions, RPC with the use of slag cement, containing 2.0% vol. of steel fibres, with a compressive strength of about 200 MPa and a flexural strength of about 57 MPa, after 180 days of curing. The water absorption of this concrete is only 2.4%, and the results of freeze-thaw resistance tests allow to assessing the freeze-thaw resistance of this concrete as very good, according to the standard SS 13 72 44. RPC has a compact microstructure and the identified C-S-H phase shows a low C/S ratio.