Corrosion Properties of Self-Compacting Lightweight Concrete Using Metakaolin

Combining the advantages of both lightweight concrete and self-compacting concrete in a single entity will be highly beneficial in offshore structures. Due to the addition of porous lightweight aggregate durability of these structures in adverse environment will be a matter of great concern. From the earlier studies, it was clear that the inclusion of metakaolin in normal aggregate concrete exhibits superior durable performance. The present study evaluates the effect of metakaolin in the corrosion performance of the high strength self-compacting lightweight aggregate concrete. The corrosion properties were accessed using various experimental techniques such as rapid chloride penetration test, surface resistivity, alkalinity and corrosion rate. All the concretes were developed with binder content 550 kg/m³ and water-binder ratio maintained as 0.28. The metakaolin replacement percentages have been varied as 7.5, 10, 12.5 and 15%. The results indicate that all the durable parameters of concretes have been improved due to the inclusion of metakaolin. Also pH level of all the concretes is well above the threshold value. This evidence justifies that metakaolin is potential material for the development of high performance lightweight self-compacting concrete.