EXPERIMENTAL STUDY ON MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF INTERNAL CURING AGENT IN CEMENT MORTAR

Abstract

Investigation study is made on spinach also termed as spinach oleracea stem is a leafy green vegetable plant and the stem is suns dried and taken as powder and used as a natural self curing agent in cement mortar. Its pH value is 7.48. The design grade of concrete was fixed at M40. The main notion behind the usage of spinach as self curing agent is to find out the presence of hydroxyl group in the chemical structure of spinach family. The chemical structure shows that it contains OH functional group. As such, the Spinacia oleracea stem powder selected as internal curing agent possesses hydroxyl group, which is also find out by using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), x-ray diffraction (XRD). From the above test results molecular structure for the spinach oleracea stem was derived. Spinach is also an effective curing agent and improves the cement hydration, compressive strength, diminishes shrinkage and accelerates the durability of concrete whereas the conventional method needs improvement.