Workability and Compressive Strength of Mortar with Addition of Rice Husk Ash (RHA) as Partial Cement Replacement in Engineered Cementitious Composite (ECC)

Abstract

In today’s engineering world, an industrial ecology is a prevalent approach for achieving long-term industrial development. This approach encourages waste from by-products to be recycled. One of these by-product wastes is rice husk ash (RHA). Previous research has highlighted RHA’s significant potential as a cement additive alternative. The possible use of RHA as a partial replacement for cement in designed cementitious composites is briefly described in the work (Engineered Cementitious Composite). RHA was utilized to substitute cement at various percentages by volume in the experiments, including 5%, 10%, 15% and 20%. The flow table test was used to evaluate the workability of the fresh mortar mix, while the compressive strength test was used to study the mechanical properties of the hardened mortar. From the result obtained, the workability of RHA-ECC decreased when the amount of RHA in the sample was increased. The compressive strength of RHA-ECC is maximum at 10% by volume compared to other replacement levels with 52.21% at 28 days of curing. This study adds to the body of knowledge about the sustainability of RHA as a partial cement replacement for ECC.