Bubble Deck Concrete Slab
M.Sindhu1, M.Hemaswathi2, B.Suvathi3, M.Sivakumar4, R.Vijayalakshmi5
1,2,3,4 UG Student,5 Assistant Professor ,Nadar Saraswathi College of Engineering and Technology.
Abstract-The composite slabs are made of Bubble
Deck type slab elements with spherical gaps, poured
in place on transversal and longitudinal directions. By
introducing the gaps leads to a 30to50% lighter slab
which reduces the loads on the columns, walls and
foundations, and of course of the entire building. The
bubbles are made by embodying high density
polypropylene in the concrete, arranged according to
the project and placed between the reinforcement
meshes. The material that are made of dont react
chemically with the concrete or the reinforcement, it
has no porosity and has enough rigidity and strength
to take over the loads as much as from the pouring of
the concrete as from the subsequent phases of this
process. The advantages are less energy consumption
- both in production, transport and carrying out, less
emission - exhaust gases from production and
transport, especially CO2 and reduce the material, the
load, lower the cost and it is also a green technology.
Key Words: Polypropylene Bubble, Spherical Gapes.
INTRODUCTION
In building constructions, the slab is a very
important structural member and it is one of the
largest member consuming concrete. A slab being
the essential part of the structure has to be
effectively designed and utilized. When the load
acting on the slab is large or clear span between
columns is more, the deflection of the slab is also
more. Therefore the slab thickness is on increasing.
Increasing the slab thickness makes the slabs
heavier because of self-weight of slab also increase,
and will increase column and foundations size.
Thus, it makes buildings consuming more materials
such as concrete and steel reinforcement.
.
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To avoid these disadvantages various studies
carried out and researchers suggest voided flat plate
slab system to reduce the self-weight of the slab.A
voided flat slab system is known as one of the
effective slab system, which can reduce self-weight
of slab. A voided flat slab has hollow void former
made
LITERATURE REVIEW:
In the 1990's, Jorgen Breuning invented a
way to link the air space and steel within a voided
biaxial concrete slab. The Bubble Deck technology
uses spheres made of recycled industrial plastic to
create air voids while providing strength through
arch action. As a result, this allows the hollow slab
to act as a normal monolithic two-way spanning
concrete slabs as a result, Bubble Deck slabs can be
lighter, stronger , and thinner than regular reinforced
concrete slabs. On studying the Literature reviews,
various studies have been conducted on the structural
behaviour of bubble deck slab. The various factors of
a two way slab such as flexural capacities, acoustics,
fire resistance, creep shrinkage etc.
SLAB MATERIAL SELECTION
1.Concrete: The concrete is made of standard
Portland cement with max aggregate size of 20 mm.
No plasticizers are necessary for concrete mixture.
2. Steel: The steel reinforcement is of Grade Fe
500 strength or higher.The top and bottom
reinforcements are then held together by welding
with the help of diagonal short length bars.
3. Plastic Spheres: The hollow spheres are made
from recycled high-density polyethylene or HDPE.
These HDPE bubbles can be slavaged and reused
and reused again or recycled. This conctributes to
the Green properties of bubble deck slab.Figure1
shows the view of hollow spherical and elliptical
bubbles.The diameter of bubbles varies from 180,
225, 270, 315, 360, 410, 500mm.
Fig.1.Hollow Bubbles
WORKING
When the load acting on the slab is large or
clear span between columns is more, the deflection
of the slab is also more. Therefore the slab thickness
is on increasing. Increasing the slab thickness makes
the slabs heavier because of self-weight of slab also
increase, and will increase column and foundations
size.
Slab elements have a bottom and an upper
concrete part connected with vertical ribs that go
around the gaps. The reinforcement of the plates is
made of two meshes one at the bottom part and one
at the upper part that can be tied or welded. The
distances between the bars correspond to the
dimensions of the bubbles that are to be embodied
and the quantity of the reinforcement from the
longitudinal and the transversal ribs of the slab. The
two mashes are connected after placing the spheres
into places in order to form a rigid shell. The
material that are made of dont react chemically
with the concrete or the reinforcement, it has no
porosity and has enough rigidity and strength to take
over the loads as much as from the pouring of the
concrete
PROPERTIES OF BUBBLE DECK SLAB
A. Flexural Strength
Bubble deck slab is conceived to omit a chamfer on the inside to ensure that concrete
significant volume of concrete (compared to a solid surrounds each bar and does not allow a direct route
slab) in the central core where the slab is principally to air from the rebar surface. This is primarily a
un-stressed in flexure. In slabs, the depth of
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compressed concrete is usually a small proportion of
the slab depth and this means that it almost always
involves only the concrete between the ball and the
surface so there is no sensible difference between
the behaviour of a solid slab and Bubble
Deck(Table1). The only elements working are the
outer shell of concrete on the compression side
and the steel on the tension side.
TABLE(1)
Comparison of bending strength in Bubble deck slab
and solid slab.
B. Shear strength
In any flat slab, design shear resistance is
usually critical near columns. Near the columns,
bubbles are left out so in these zones a Bubble deck
slab is designed exactly the same way as a solid
slab. Shear resistance of Bubble deck slab is 0.6
times the shear resistance of a solid slab of the same
thickness.
C.Durability
The durability of bubble deck slab is not
fundamentally different from ordinary solid slabs.
When the filigree slabs are manufactured, the
reinforcement module and balls are vibrated into the
concrete and the standard and uniformity of
compaction is such that a density of surface concrete
is produced which is at least as impermeable and
durable, arguably more so, to that normally
produced on site. Bubble deck slab joints have a
function of the fire resistance but is also relevant to the steel is controlled by the fire and the insulation
durability. of the steel from the fire. If the standard bubble
material is used (HDPE), products of combustion
are relatively benign, certainly compared to other
D. Deflection materials that would also be burning in the vicinity.
Span depth ratio calculations for deflections
are very approximate and are not appropriate in flat Fire resistance depends on concrete cover nearly 60-
slabs of irregular layout except for the most simple 180 minutes. Smoke Resistance is about 1.5 times
or unimportant cases. FE modeling, including non- the fire resistance. Depth of smokeless is than 10 m
linear cracked section analysis is used to calculate on both sides. Balls simply carbonize. No toxic
the deflection using normal structural concrete with gasses will be released .
a Youngs Modulus (secant) Ecm, multiplied by 0.9
and a tensile strength, fctm multiplied by 0.8 (to H.Contact between Bubbles & Reinforcement
reduce the crack moment as mentioned above. This Tests carried out in Denmark,Germany and
is mainly significant in the computation of Holland showed that the flexural stiffness is
uncracked curvatures where the geometry of the approximately 87% to 93% of the same thickness of
concrete section is significant but is of increasingly solid slab - In design we use an average of 90% and,
negligible significance after cracking). It is not in addition, the cracking moment is factored by 80%
presently possible to calculate for the difference in as recommended in Dutch research. In fact one of
age related properties in the filigree and in-situ the major benefits of the system is its virtue of
concrete parts. This is not considered to be a reducing deflections for a given span because the
significant weakness. one-third weight reduction overwhelmingly more
than compensates for the very small reduction in
E. Sound insulation stiffness.
A comparison was made between
BubbleDeck and oneway prefabricated hollow deck
of similar height. The noise reduction with TESTING PROCEDURE
BubbleDeck was 1db higher than the one way The tested slabs were simply supported and
prefabricated hollow deck .Test results are as shown loaded with a single-point load(Fig.2.). The slabs
in Table [2]. The main criterion for reducing noise is have been tested at ages of (28) days. The slab
the weight of the deck and therefore BubbleDeck specimens were placed on the testing machine and
will not act otherwise than other deck types with adjusted the centreline, supports, point load and dial
equal weight.(TABLE 2) gauge
were in their correct or best locations. At the end of
SOUND INSULATION TEST RESULT each load increment, observations and
measurements were recorded for the mid-span
deflection and crack development and propagation
on the slab surface. The deflection of the specimens
was measured at their mid span beneath the lower
face of the tested slabs. When the slab reached
advanced stage of loading, smaller increments were
applied until failure, where the load indicator
stopped recording anymore and the deflections
increased very fast without any increase in applied
TABLE[ 2] load.
G.Fire resistance
The fire resistance of the slab is a
complex matter but is chiefly dependent on the
ability of the steel to retain sufficient strength during
a fire when it will be heated and lose significant
strength as the temperature rises. The temperature of

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 Fig.2.Testing on Slab

GRAPH 2:WEIGHT OF SLAB

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Table[3].Shows load ,deflection,weight of slab.

GRAPH 3:LOAD CARRYING CAPACITY ON SLAB

DISCUSSION
In that experiment found that the bubble
deck (continuous) is reduced the volume of concrete
so that weight of slab ultimately decrease.
Simultaneously the load carrying capacity has also
increase as compare to conventional slab. But the
arrangement of the bubbles are effect on the load
carrying capacity of the slab, in alternative
arrangement of bubbles are increase the load
carrying capacity than conventional slab but less
than continuous bubble deck slab.
Simultaneously, bubble deck slab has
improve the elasticity property of slab, such as
conventional slab is less deflect than bubble deck
slab, and quantity of bubbles in slab also affect on
the this elasticity property. Weight reduction is the
important factor is found in bubble deck slab.
Weight of the conventional slab is more than the
bubble deck slab.
GRAPH 1:DEFLECTION BEHAVIOUR ON SLAB

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IV. FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS Fig.4. Cut through section of Bubble deck slab
In order to understand the response of the
system, analysis was performed to compare the
response of this new type of floor with a typical flat,
solid concrete slab. A 3D solid slab and a Bubble
Deck slab were modeled in SAP2000 with all the
same dimensions and as two-way spanning floor
systems. The solid slab was generated as thick shells
of pure concrete while the Bubble Deck slab was
designated as a layered shell(Fig.3).The bubbles are
arranged between two thin layers of standard
concrete on top and bottom(Fig.4). THE simplified
Bubble Deck layers as used in the analysis. Both
models were subjected to an live load in addition to
their own self- weight for the static analysis. The
material properties used are standard concrete M30
and HDPE .
. Fig.5.ReinforcingMesh
Fig.3. BUBBLE DECK SHELL LAYER

Table.(4).Forces and stress developed in bubble deck and solid slab

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CONCLUSION:
The market of construction floors in the building
industry consists mainly of massive concrete floors.
But this innovative slab construction technology is
proven to be more efficient than a traditional biaxial
concrete slab in an office floor system. The finite
element models of the office slabs created for this
study in SAP2000 verify the prior analysis and
experiments.
Less emission - exhaust gases from
production and transport, Especially co2.
In comparative of conventional slab the
volume of Concrete in bubble deck
(continuous) are less required, that is 25%
approximately. So that the weight of slab is
decrease.
Bending stresses in the bubble deck slab are
found to be 6.43% lesser than that of a solid
slab.
Deflection of Bubble deck is 5.88% more
than the solid slab as the stiffness is reduced
due to the hollow portion
References:
1. Arati Shetkarand & Nagesh Hanche an Experimental
Study On bubble deck slab system with elliptical
balls, NCRIET-2015 &Indian J.Sci.Res. 12(1):021-
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Deck slab, International Journal of Advanced
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(IJARTET) Vol. II, Special Issue X, March 2015.
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Analysis of Voided Slab with High Density
Polypropylene Void Formers International Journal of
Chem Tech Research, CODEN (USA): IJCRGG
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Shear resistance of bubble deck slab is 0.6
times the shear resistance of the solid slab of
same thickness. However required resistance
can be achieved by providing vertical
reinforcement.
Less energy consumption both in
production, Transport and carrying out.
Cost and time saving by using bubbles in the
slab like Weight of slab, concrete volume
indirectly load on the Beam and walls also
decrease/ less so that building Foundations
can be designed for smaller dead loads.
Concrete usage is reduced as 1 kg of
recycled plastic replaces 100 kg of concrete.
This avoids the cement production and
allows reduction in global CO2 emissions.
Hence this technology is environmentally
green and sustainable.
7. A. Churakov Biaxial hollow slab with innovative
types of voids, Saint-Petersburg Polytechnical
University, 29 Polytechnicheskayast. St. Petersburg,
195251, Russia, ISSN 2304-6295.6 (21) 2014. 70-88.
8. Amer M. Ibrahim, Nazar K. Ali, Wissam D. Salman
Flexural capacities of reinforced concrete two-way
bubble deck slabs of plastic spherical voids Diyala
Journal of Engineering Sciences, ISSN 1999-8716,
Vol. 06, No. 02, June 2013.
9. L. R. terec, M. A. Terec The bubbledeck floor system:
a brief presentation, CS I, INCD URBAN-INCERC
Branch of Cluj-Napoca, CONSTRUCII No. 2 /
2013.
10. Wesley N. Mascarenhas Viscoelastic Analysis of
Biaxial Hollow Deck Balls, International Journal of
Computer Aided Engineering, ISSN: 1071-2317,
Vol.23, Issue.1, recent science publications archives,
January 2013.