Anomalous Method of Cement-Sand Ratio Evaluation in Hardened Cement-Mortar or Cement-Concrete

Construction or creation is a genetic human tendency and places, pyramids, houses, villas, bridges, fly-overs, etc. are living examples of this inborn tendency. Civil construction is possible through proper binding materials which can bind all the construction components together. Lime has been used for centuries for this purpose but in the modern era, Portland cement has taken its place. Portland cement is widely being used to bind bricks, stones, or other construction materials in the form of cement- mortar or cement concrete. Cement-mortar or cement -concrete is made by mixing cement in a certain ratio to fine aggregates(sand) or fine and coarse aggregates together, and this certain ratio is quite important for the durability, strength, and sustainability of any civil construction. Sometimes, civil construction gets collapsed unfortunately and the ratio of cement-sand becomes the crucial point of investigation to ascertain the cause of failure. The most used method for this purpose is the acid digestion method, which is based on an insoluble percentage of silica in the cement-mortar or cement-concrete, but this method is quite lengthy having multiple stages of filtering, drying, weighing, causing multiple sources of errors. For precision, the silica percentage is being calculated through EDX/XRF nowadays. EDX/XRF method is fast as well as precise also but requires quite a costly set up as well as quite a time consuming also in respect of proper sampling and sample preparation. The present method is almost emerged as precise as the acid digestion method but gives quicker results with fewer error sources.