Abstract

• Bamboo is the common term applied to a broad group (1250 species) of large woody grasses, ranging from 10 cm to 40 m in height. The use of waste materials with pozzolanic properties in concrete production is becoming a worldwide practice. This paper presents investigates the strength performance of concrete using partial blends of cement and bamboo wastes ash. Elemental analysis was conducted on bamboo ash and ordinary portland cement, OPC by EDXRF (Energy Dispersive X-ray Fluorescence) technique to evaluate its percentage composition. Bamboo ash shows pozzolanic activity and it was used as supplementary cementitious material. Bamboo ash was then used to replace OPC by weight in ratio of 0%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20% and 25% in concrete grade M-20. Based upon the quantities of ingredients of the mixes M-20, (it means the weight ratio of cement : sand :coarse aggregate) grade concretes were prepared. Twelve pieces of 150 mm concrete cubes were prepared. These cubes were tested at 7 days and 56 days of curing ages and then maximum load and compressive strength of cubes were determined respectively. To investigate the pozzolanic behavior of bamboo ash, concrete crushes were analyzed by XRD analysis. It shows the very high concrete strength values could be obtained with (ordinary portland cement and bamboo waste ash) OPC–BWA blended cement concrete when high control measure was applied and at longer days of hydration. Therefore, OPC/BWS blended cement concrete could be used in civil engineering and building works, thereby reducing the cost of production.