Aggregate is a collective term for the mineral materials such as
sand, gravel and crushed stone that are used with a binding medium (such as water, bitumen, portland cement, lime, etc.) to form compound materials (such as asphalt concrete and portland cement concrete). Aggregates can either be natural or manufactured. FINE AGGREGATES • The aggregates which passes through a 4.75 mm IS sieve. • Sand is generally considered to have a lower size limit of about 0.07 • Material between 0.06 mm and 0.00 mm is classified as silt • Other left particles are called as clay TYPES OF FINE AGGREGATES:- 1. Natural sand 2. Crushed stone sand 3. Crushed gravel sand COARSE AGGREGATES • The aggregates which are retained on the 4.75 mm IS sieve • They contain only that much of fine material as is permitted by the specifications TYPES OF COARSE AGGREGATES:- 1.Crushed gravel 2.Uncrushed gravel 3.Partially crushed gravel ESTIMATION OF COARSE AGGREGATE PROPORTION:- Estimation of Fine Aggregate Proportion Estimation of Fine Aggregate Proportion With the completion of procedure given in 4.4, all the ingredients have been estimated except the coarse and fine aggregate content. These quantities are determined by finding out the absolute volume of cementitious material, water and the chemical admixture; by dividing their mass by their respective specific gravity, multiplying by III 000 and subtracting the result of their summation from unit volume. The values so obtained are divided into Coarse and Fine Aggregate fractions by volume in accordance with coarse aggregate proportion already determined in 4.4. The coarse and fine aggregate contents are then determined by multiplying with their respective specific gravities and multiplying by 1000. Volume of coarse aggregate is required to be increased to decrease the fine aggregate content and vice versa at the rate of -/+ 0.01 for every ± 0.05 change in water-cement ratio Fineness Modulus In 1925, Duff Abrams introduced the concept of fineness modulus (FM) for estimating the proportions of fine and course aggregates in concrete mixtures. The premise: "aggregate of the same fineness modulus will require the same quantity of water to produce a mix of the same consistency and give a concrete of the same strength." Before calculating FM, lab technicians perform a sieve analysis to determine the particle size distribution, or grading, of the aggregate sample. FM is the sum of the total percentages retained on each specified sieve divided by 100. ASTM C 33 requires the FM of fine aggregate to be between 2.3 and 3.1. The higher the FM, the coarser the aggregate. Fine aggregate affects many concrete properties, including workability and finishability. Usually, a lower FM results in more paste, making concrete easier to finish. For the high cement contents used in the production of high- strength concrete, coarse sand with an FM around 3.0 produces concrete with the best workability and highest compressive strength.