A H M 531 Cement consistency and Setting time By: Ahmed Essam Mansour

Concrete Laboratory

Name: Ahmed Essam Mansour

Reg. number: 0045854

Title: Tests of Cement consistency and

setting time

Group:
A H M 531
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Date:

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A H M 531 Cement consistency and Setting time By: Ahmed Essam Mansour

Introduction:
In the concrete laboratory we grouped into two groups to and started with
tests of cement.
Two tests are going to be held on cement, and we have done the first test
on the last week and Im reporting about in this report.
The test is called Consistence and setting times of Portland cement; this
test was separated into two parts. The first one aims to get the consistence
of standard cement paste, and the second one is to calculate the initial and
final setting time of neat cement past of standard consistence.
As the amount of water used in hydrating cement affect setting time
(more water, more time needed for setting), we needed a specific amount
of water that gives us a standard paste we could use for testing, from here
the need of Normal Consistence Cement Paste existed.
Initial setting time is the time from mixing dry cement with water till the
beginning of interlocking of the gel.
Final setting time is the time from mixing dry cement with water till the
end of interlocking of the gel.
It is very important to know the setting times. Knowing the initial setting
time is important in estimating free time for transporting, placing,
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compaction and shaping of cement paste.
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Objectives:
1. Making Normal Consistence cement paste.
2. Measuring the initial setting time and the final setting time of the
standard consistence of the cement paste.

Standards:

1. Consistence of standard cement paste:

B.S : 12
A.S.T.M : C-187

2. Initial and final setting times of Portland cement:

B.S : 12
A.S.T.M : C 191-70

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A H M 531 Cement consistency and Setting time By: Ahmed Essam Mansour

Apparatus & Materials:

1. VICAT Apparatus.
2. Digital weighing scale, used to measure the weight of dry cement.
3. Glass graduates, used to measure the volume of water.
4. Trowel.
5. Mixing bowl.
6. Stop-watch.
7. Portland Pozzolan Cement.
8. Water.

About the VICAT Apparatus:

It consists of the following:

1. Ruler starting from 40 mm
(which is the height of the
mould).
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2. The Mould.
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3. Non-porous plate.
4. The plunger.

Note: The depth is always measured from the

bottom of the mould.

Needles of penetration:

1. For making the normal consistence of standard paste we use a

plunger with 10mm diameter.
2. Initial setting needle, 1mm in diameter. Used in the determination
of the initial setting time.
3. Final setting needle, it is a needle with a metal attachment
hollowed out so as to leave a circular cutting edge 5mm in
diameters and set 0.5mm behind the tip of the needle.

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A H M 531 Cement consistency and Setting time By: Ahmed Essam Mansour

Procedures:

Part I: Normal consistency.

1. Weigh 500 grams of cement using the digital weighing scale.

Be aware of subtracting the weight of the mixing bowl from the
total weight we obtain.
2. Measure an amount of water (lets start with 150 mm3) of water
using the glass graduate. (This amount of water is nearly 26%-33%
of the amount of cement).
3. Mix the obtained cement with the obtained water together in the
mixing bowl.
(The mixture should be homogenous and totally mixed during
4.25).
4. Fill the mould of the VICAT apparatus with the mixed cement, the
surface of the paste should be smoothed off level with the top of
the mould as quickly as possible.
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5. We place the mould in its place in the VICAT apparatus and we

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use the 10mm diameter plunger, we lower it till it touches the paste
and then we leave it falling freely.
6. We take the depth from the VICAT ruler, if the depth is between 5-
7 mm then we got the standard paste with normal consistency,
otherwise we do other trial with fresh cement.

Part II: Setting time measurement.

1. Once we determine the normal consistency, we can use the taken

specification of that paste to measure the initial and final setting
times.
So we make a fresh cement paste using the amount of water and
cement of the standard consistency. The stop-watch shall start at
this step.
2. We use the 1 mm diameter needle, and penetrate the sample with
this needle by leaving it to free fall, and then we read the VICAT
ruler scale. We do a trial each 15 minutes until the depth of
penetration is 5 mm. The elapsed time from mixing the water with
dry cement till this moment is called initial setting time.
3. We replace the needle with another angular one (Final setting
needle), and penetrate the sample by it every 15 minutes till only

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A H M 531 Cement consistency and Setting time By: Ahmed Essam Mansour

the needle makes an impression on the paste surface but the

cutting edge fails to.

Discussion:
Part I: Normal consistency.

We made three trials to achieve our result of the normal consistency using
fresh cement in each trial.

Trial # Amount of cement Amount of water Depth of penetration

1 500 grams 150 mm3 16 mm

2 500 grams 155 mm3 9 mm
3 500 grams 160 mm3 5 mm

Part II: Setting time measurement.

Time Penetration
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5 min 0
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20 min
35 min
1 mm
3 mm
55 min 4 mm
70 min 5 mm

The initial setting time is 70 min (i.e. 1:10)

The final setting time is 10 hours.

Conclusion:
To measure the setting times of cement, we have to do our tests on
cement of standard consistency.
Normal consistency of standard cement can be gained by using the W \ C
ratio and depending on 26%- 33%.
The higher rate of water the more initial setting time needed.

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