A Study on Moisture Transport of Artificial Lightweight Concrete

For the first step on the quantitative evaluation of shrinkage reduction and differential shrinkage analysis of lightweight aggregate concrete, this study sets the moisture transport model of concrete by pre-absorbed water of porous lightweight aggregates and measured effective moisture diffusion coefficient, moisture capacity, degree of humidity supply and degree of humidity consumption by water binder ratio and aggregate type. The effective moisture diffusion coefficient in steady state caused by humidity difference between inside and outside of concrete had low value as low water-binder ratio. And in case of same water-binder ratio, effective moisture diffusion of mixtures used normal aggregates were lower than those used lightweight aggregates. To determine moisture store capability of concrete - moisture capacity, moisture contents were measured in 9 humidity conditions. As a result moisture contents of mixtures used lightweight aggregates was higher than mixtures used normal aggregates in all humidity conditions. This study measured lightweight aggregates' degree of humidity supply that applicable to normal atmospheric environment (above RH 50%) and made it quantitatively. Also amount of moisture release was set as a exponential function that represents a clear trend proportion to time and inverse proportion to humidity of the surroundings. As the result of measurement about degree of moisture consumption inside concrete following the internal consumption caused by cement hydration self-drying, it was showed that rapid decrease of humidity, around 10%, at early ages (7~10 days) when water-binder ratio is 0.3 and slow decrease around 5% and 1% when water-binder ratio is 0.4 and 0.5.