International Journal of Innovative Technology and Exploring Engineering (IJITEE)
Two current concerns of Vietnamese Government are related to overexploitation of natural river sand, and the dumping of bottom ash (BA) in landfills and ponds. These activities have a negative influence on the environment. In this study, BA is utilized to partially or fully substitute river sand for the production of normal strength concrete. Three river sand concrete mixtures with water/binder (w/b) ratios of 0.36, 0.39, and 0.42 were used to study the effect of w/b on concrete properties. On the other hand, to investigate the influence of BA content on concrete properties, another four concrete mixtures were designed with a fixed w/b ratio of 0.36 and the river sand in these mixtures was replaced by BA at different levels of 30% 50% 70% and 100% Test results indicate that higher values of the slump, water absorption (WA) and porosity were associated with a higher w/b ratio. Whereas, increasing w/b ratio resulted in reducing unit weight (UW) compressive strength (CS) and ultrasonic pulse velocity (UPV) of concrete. Additionally, the inclusion of more BA in the concrete mixtures led to the reduction of the slump, UW, CS, and UPV and the increment of WA, porosity, and electrical resistance (ER) of concrete.