Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Construction and Building Materials

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

Performance of geopolymer concrete containing recycled rubber

Aly Muhammed Aly a, M.S. El-Feky b, Mohamed Kohail a,⇑, El-Sayed A.R. Nasr a
a
Structural Engineering Department, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt
b
Department of Civil Engineering, National Research Centre, Cairo, Egypt

h i g h l i g h t s

Waste rubber was used in geopolymer concrete as an alternative to aggregates.

The hardened properties and impact resistance are discussed.

The compressive strength slightly enhanced with increasing waste rubber content.

Waste rubber increases the impact resistance of rubberized geopolymer concrete.

The mix can be used in bridge approach slabs, railway buffers, and airport runways.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: For the past few years, the construction field industry is responding to the challenge of incorporating
Received 6 October 2018 sustainability in the production processes, this was done through the utilization of solid waste materials
Received in revised form 26 January 2019 as aggregates in concrete or via searching for more environmentally friendly raw materials. Producing
Accepted 19 February 2019
binders free of Portland cement is one of the most innovative ways to substitutes the Portland cement.
Using a cementitious material (steel slag or blast furnace slag) or pozzolanic materials (fly ash or silica
fume) activated with alkali activators. These alkali-activated binder systems are called geopolymer
Keywords:
concrete. One of the possible solutions for the use of waste tire rubber is to incorporate into geopolymer
Geopolymer concrete
Crumb rubber
concrete as a substitution of natural aggregate. This study designed to investigate the effect of different
Blast furnace slag percentages of crumb rubber as a partial substitution of both; fine, and coarse aggregates by volume per-
Compressive strength centage (0, 10, 20 and 30%) on the hardened properties (compressive, tensile and flexural strength) and
Rubberized geopolymer concrete impact resistance of slag based geopolymer concrete (replacing the cement by; ground granulated blast
Impact resistance furnace slag (GGBFS) activated with sodium silicate and sodium hydroxide). Finally, the work provides
the mix with high compressive strength, ductility and impact resistance to be used in structural elements
subjected to impact and dynamic load such as (bridge approach slabs, railway buffers, and airport
runways).
Ó 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Disposal of waste tire rubber has turned into a noteworthy
environmental issue all around the world. Consistently a huge
number of tires are disposed of, thrown away or buried throughout
the world, a very serious danger to the environment [1,2]. It is esti-
mated that every year almost thousand million tires end their ser-
vice life and out of that, over half are disposed to landfills or waste,
with no treatment [3–9]. The disposed of tires are discarded in dif-
ferent ways like landfilling, burning, use as fuel, pyrolysis, to pro-
duce carbon black etc. Stored tires likewise present numerous
kinds of health, environmental and economic risks through the
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: m.kohail@eng.asu.edu.eg (M. Kohail).
air, water and soil pollution [6,10–12]. For the past few years,
the construction field industry is responding to the challenge of
incorporating sustainability in the production processes, this was
done through the utilization of solid waste materials as aggregates
in concrete or via searching for more environmentally friendly raw
materials [13,14]. One of the conceivable solutions for the utiliza-
tion of disposed of tire rubber is to be incorporated into concrete as
a replacement of the natural aggregates. This approach could be
environmentally friendly as it helps to prevent the environmental
pollution impact through the disposal of the waste tires. It likewise
diminishes the carbon dioxide emission by the prevention of tire
fires. Subsequently, rubberized concrete have drawn great atten-
tion to be considered as a successful method for the structural
applications which could possibly help in reducing environmental
hazards. The output from several early investigations

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2019.02.121
0950-0618/Ó 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144
demonstrated that concrete incorporating rubber crumbs
enhances impact resistance, while on the other hand reduces com-
pressive and flexural strengths. There is a settled agreement about
the extreme decrease in the mechanical properties due to the
increase in the rubber content [13–17].
Portland cement is an excellent construction building material.
Its production, however, is energy consumer (requiring kiln tem-
peratures of 1450–1550 °C) and has other major environmental
effects. Generating around one ton of CO2 for each one ton of
Portland cement production, this binder is one of the fundamental
reasons behind global warming (accounting for about seven per-
cent of global CO2 emissions). In addition, Portland cement manu-
facturing includes significant over-utilization of natural resources,
for the most part, limestone quarries. It takes the world more than
three billion tons of raw materials (seventy percent are limestone)
to only produce two billion ton Portland cement output. All the
previously mentioned factors initiates the investigation and devel-
opment of new alternative construction materials with reduced
energy and lowered environmental costs (lower CO2 emissions,
reuse of industrial by-products) while keeping the performance
of these materials as high as or higher than ordinary Portland
cement (OPC) [18].
Geopolymer concrete, an inorganic polymer concrete, has
developed as a greener substitute for OPC based concrete, with
great properties like high mechanical properties, low creep, low
shrinkage, and extraordinary acid resistance [19–22]. Geopolymer
adhere the loose fine aggregates, coarse aggregates, and other
unreacted materials together to form the geopolymer concrete
[23]. It is an alkali-activated binder produced by a polymeric
reaction between alkaline liquids and the silicon and aluminum
oxides in source materials of geological origin. Many examples
for the geological originated materials can be activated like meta-
kaolinite or other industrial by-product materials such as fly ash
and blast furnace slag [24]. Subsequently, It not only produces less
CO2 than OPC, but also produces added-value construction mate-
rial products via the reuse of the industrial by-products with an
alumino-silicate composition [20,23].
Restricted investigations have been directed on the impact of
crumb rubber on geopolymer concrete mixtures even despite the
fact that it has increased much consideration in structural
Fig. 1. The Sieve analysis of used crumb rubber mix.
137
applications among the various experimental investigations
conducted in the literature references. moreover, the rubber
content significantly affect the compressive, and tensile strengths
of rubberized concrete, however the restricted data available on
the mechanical properties of rubberized geopolymer concrete still
leaves things unclear and additional proofs are needed to verify the
possibility of producing rubberized geopolymer concrete compos-
ites where crumb rubber is a partial replacement of both fine and
coarse aggregates. This paper investigates the effects of different
percentages of crumb rubber as a partial substitution of both fine
and coarse aggregates by volume % (0, 10, 20 and 30%) on the hard-
ened properties (compressive, tensile and flexural strength) and
impact resistance of slag based geopolymer concrete. Finally, the
work provides rubberized geopolymer concrete mixture with high
strengths, ductility and impact resistance to be used in structural
elements subjected to impact and dynamic load such as (bridge
approach slabs, railway buffers and airport runways).
2. Experimental program
2.1. Material
All test specimens were fabricated using locally available mate-
rials. Natural available clean sand with particles size smaller than
0.5 mm. Sand with specific gravity 2.65 g/cm3 while the fineness
modulus of 2.25 was used as fine aggregate, Clean Crushed dolo-
mite of maximum size of 12 mm and specific gravity of 2.96 g/
cm3 was used as coarse aggregate, The aggregates for the mixtures
consist of a combination of crushed dolomite and fine sand with
percentage of 65% and 35% by weight respectively. Crumb rubber
is recycled rubber produced from automotive and truck scrap tires.
The granulated is sized by passing through a screen, the used size
based on a dimension consists of a combination of size (mesh 40)
and size (1–4 mm) with percentage of 70% and 30% by weight
respectively, the crumb rubber with specific gravity 0.45. (Fig. 1)
shows the sieve analysis of crumb rubber mixture compared to
limits of Egyptian code.
The main constituents of geopolymer concrete are the source
materials (slag) as binder and the alkaline liquids, which serve as
the activator. Egyptian Ground granulated blast furnace slag
138 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144

Table 1
The chemical composition of used GGBFS by XRF.

Element SiO2 Fe2O3 Al2O3 CaO MgO SO3 CL

Content % 39.79 1.20 11.15 34.38 7.610 0.46 0.0125

Table 2
The chemical composition of used Sodium Hydroxide (NaOH).
Element Na2O
Content % 60.25
Table 3
The chemical composition of used Sodium Silicate (S.S).
Element Na2O SiO3
Content % 11.98 31.0
(GGBFS) used as a binder in this investigation was obtained from
the Iron and Steel Company, Helwan is the main component used
in the production of alkali-activated concretes after being ground
to the size micron and specific gravity of 2.85 g/cm3. The chemical
composition of (GGBFS) is shown in (Table 1).
A combination of sodium hydroxide (NaOH) and sodium silicate
solutions (S.S) was used as the activator (the alkaline liquid). Pure
sodium hydroxide is a whitish solid, sold in pellets, flakes, and
granular form as well as in solution. It is highly soluble in water;
the chemical composition of sodium hydroxide used in this study
is shown in (Table 2). Sodium silicate usually knows as ‘‘water
glass” or ‘‘liquid glass”, is well-known due to wide commercial
and industrial application. Sodium silicate products are manufac-
tured as solids or thick liquids, depending on proposed use. The
chemical composition of the liquid glassy sodium silicate used in
this study is shown in (Table 3). The sodium silicate solution was
added to the required amount of hydroxide solution to prepare
the alkaline solution.
2.2. Mixing procedure and mixture constituents
Based on the limited past research on rubberized geopolymer
mixtures available in the literature and the experience gained dur-
ing the preliminary experimental works, the parameters consid-
ered for the constituents of the mixtures were as follows:
This study containing 4 mixtures which will be prepared using
natural fine and coarse aggregates, different percentages of crumb
rubber, Ground granulated blast furnace slag as a binder, sodium
silicate, sodium hydroxide and water.
The mixtures were prepared with different replacement ratios
of crumb rubber of (0%, 10%, 20% and 30%) by volume of both fine
and coarse aggregates in the mix. The aggregates for the mixtures
consisted of a combination of crushed dolomite and natural sand,
with 35% natural sand of total aggregate weight.
All mixtures will be prepared by mixing the slag, coarse aggre-
gates, fine aggregates and crumb rubber in a laboratory concrete
H2O drum mixer. They were mixed in dry condition for 2 min, with
39.75
mixing the liquid sodium silicate, sodium hydroxide flakes and
water in a laboratory beaker. They were mixed until all NaOH
flakes dissolved. Then, adding the solution to the binder and mix-
ing for 2 min. All used cubes, cylinders and prisms were filled by
rubberized geopolymer concrete, then they were compacted on a
vibrating table in two and three layers respectively. Each layer
H2O
was vibrated for 10 s. After that, the specimens were demolded
57.0 after one day and cured in water at a room temperature to test
days. (Table 4) shows components based on mass ratio for each
mix.
2.3. Testing method
Different percentages of crumb rubber were used as a partial
replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates by volume (0, 10,
20 and 30%) for slag based geopolymer concrete mixes. For each
mix, a total of 6 cubes (100*100*100 mm3) were prepared to per-
form compressive strength test after 28 and 60 days as per ASTM
C39, 3 Cylinders of 100 mm diameter and 200 mm height were cast
for tensile strength test as per ASTM C496 after 60 days, 3 discs
(150 mm diameter * 65 mm height) were prepared to perform
Impact resistance under drop weight test as per ACI Committee
544 after 60 days, 3 prisms (50*50*200 mm3) were prepared to
perform flexural tensile strength as per ASTM C78 after 60 days,
and 3 prisms (50*50*200 mm3) were prepared to perform impact
resistance under flexural loading after 60 days. Universal testing
machine SHIMADZU 1000 KN (Fig. 2) were used to test compres-
sive strength, splitting tensile strength, and flexural tensile
strength as per the test setup (3-point loading test) shown in
(Figs. 3 and 4), where, (Fig. 5) shows impact resistance under drop
weight test.
The drop weight test was carried out by dropping a steel ball
with mass (m = 4.5 kg) freely from a height (h = 450 mm) under
gravity acceleration (g = 9.81 m/s2) repeatedly. The steel ball was
dropped on the centre of the upper face of 150 mm * 65 mm cylin-
drical rubberized geopolymer concrete disk. For each specimen,
the number of blows corresponding to initial crack and ultimate
failure was recorded. The first number was identified by the
appearance of the first visible hair crack on the top (Ni). The test
was continued until complete failure occurs at number of blows
(NF) which applied to spread the cracks until specimen parts are
moved away from specimen circumference. The values of Ni and
Nf were designated as initial crack resistance factor and final crack
resistance factor respectively.

Table 4
Mixtures constituents (kg) per 1 m3.

Concrete Mix (ID) Slag H2O NaOH S.S Sand Coarse Rubber Mesh 40 Rubber 1–4 mm
C 500 36.344 195.204 75.53 525 975 0 0
M1 500 36.344 195.204 75.53 472 877.5 17.83 7.64
M2 500 36.344 195.204 75.53 420 780 35.66 15.283
M3 500 36.344 195.204 75.53 367 682.5 53.49 22.92

Mixture constituent:
C: Refer to control geopolymer concrete mixture with ground granulated blast furnace slag.
M: Refer to geopolymer concrete mixture with ground granulated blast furnace slag; the number refers to the percentage of aggregates replacement with crumb rubber.
 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144
Fig. 2. Universal testing machine SHIMADZU 1000 kN.
Fig. 3. Indirect Tensile Strength Test.
Fig. 4. Flexural Tensile Strength Test.
The impact energy at initial crack (Ei) was calculated by the
equation given below:
Ei ¼ Ni mgh
Similarly, the impact energy at final crack (Ef) was calculated by
the equation given below:
Ef ¼ Nf mgh
Impact resistance under flexural loading test on the beam was
performed to determine the potential energy of rubberized
geopolymer concrete. The test was carried out by dropping a steel
139
Fig. 5. Drop weight test.
ball with mass (m = 0.50 kg) on the mid span of the prism from a
height (h = 500 mm), as shown in (Fig. 6). Number of drops up to
failure, (Nf) was measured and energy absorbed by the specimen,
Ep,fl (subscript fl denotes flexural loading) was calculated by the fol-
lowing equation:
X
Nf
Ep;fl ¼ mi ghi
i¼1
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Hardened properties of rubberized geopolymer concrete
General mechanical properties of hardened rubberized geopoly-
mer concrete are dependent on both the base materials and the
preparation procedure and mixing sequence of the geopolymer
concrete [25,26]. Based on literature, the most common reported
effect of introducing rubber crumbs at all size to concrete was
the decrease in all of the mechanical properties as; the compres-
sive strength, the flexure strength and the tensile strength [26–32].
3.1.1. Compressive strength
The compressive strength is the most important index of evalu-
ating geopolymer concrete and is broadly used as an index of the
concrete strength. Most investigations revealed that there was
extreme reduction in the compressive strength of rubberized con-
crete when the volume of rubber utilized in the concrete mixture
exceeds more than five percent of its total volume [33–35].
(Fig. 7) illustrates the compressive strength results of all mixes
with replacement for both; fine, and coarse aggregates by crumb
Fig. 6. Impact resistance under flexural loading.
140 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144
rubber. The replacement ranged from 0% to 30% in a slag based
geopolymer concrete at 28 and 60 days.
The replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates by different
percentages of crumb rubber for slag based geopolymer concrete
has influenced the compressive strength at 28 and 60 days.
The compressive strength value of control mixture at 28 and
60 days was (37.4 MPa) and (53.13 MPa) respectively. Countering
to the reported literature, compressive test results at both 28 and
60 days for 10% of aggregates replacement have slight gaining
compared to control mixture about 7%. This can be attributed to
the effect of using a combination of sodium hydroxide and sodium
silicate solutions as an activator (the alkaline liquid) to produce
geopolymer concrete. According to literature [36], the pre-
treatment for rubber particles using NaOH increases the roughness
of their outer surface leading to increased adhesion between
rubber and the surrounding cement paste and hence enhancing
the mechanical properties as the strength. In this study, NaOH used
as an activator to produce rubberized geopolymer concrete, at
slight amount of crumb rubber (10%) NaOH reacts with rubber
particles causes enhancement in strength, the behaviour of NaOH
pre-treatment for rubber particles is working against the negative
effect of increasing percentage of crumb rubber.
By increasing the percentage of aggregate replacement by
crumb rubber to 20% then 30%, it was noticed that the compressive
strength decreased as compared to control mixture as shows in
(Fig. 7). For both 20% and 30% of aggregate replacement, the
28 days compressive strength values were (28.30 MPa and
24.80 MPa) with losing 24% and 34% respectively compared to
compressive strength of control mixture, while compressive
strength values were (42.20 MPa and 38.30 MPa) at 60 days with
losing 21% and 28% respectively compared to compressive strength
of control mixture.
Increasing percentages of crumb rubber to 20%, and 30% while
keeping the amount of NaOH constant in all mixtures lead to coun-
terproductive effect on the enhancement of the compressive
strength as compared to mixture with 10% crumb rubber replace-
ment. With increasing percentages of crumb rubber, NaOH
couldn’t enhance the texture of all crumb rubber percentages that
lead to increasing in the amount of uncured crumb rubber with
smooth texture over cured crumb rubber with rough surface. The
relatively smooth texture of rubber particles results in low bond
Fig 7. Compressive Strength for replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates of slag based geopolymer concrete with crumb rubber at both 28 and 60 days.
between rubber particles and geopolymer matrix. The lower stiff-
ness of rubber particles produces higher internal tensile stresses
that cause early failure in the geopolymer concrete and then
strength reduction.
In addition and as it has been previously reported, the reasons
behind the negative effect of rubber on Portland cement concrete
strength that could be applied on the geopolymer concrete as well
are summarized as follows; a) due to the high contrast between
elastic modulus of concrete aggregates and rubber [35]. Thus, the
rubber particles with low stiffness do not carry the load in the con-
crete matrix. This impact of rubber was termed ‘‘reduction in the
effective surface of concrete’’ [37]. Moreover, b) the deformability
of the rubber particles contrasting the cement paste surrounding
them, results in high stress concentrations around the rubber par-
ticles, leading to early failure of rubberized concrete samples under
the applied load which results in initiating cracks around the rub-
ber particles in a manner similar to that occurs with air voids in
normal concrete. Besides, c) the weak bond between rubber parti-
cles and cement paste results in the formation of weak Interfacial
Transition Zone (ITZ) between rubber particles and cement matrix
[38]. The formation of weak adhesion lowers pavement concrete
mechanical properties. Also, d) the sand content of concrete mix-
ture has an essential role in concrete strength [26]. That is why,
the substitution of the sand content with crumb rubber will most
probably results in the formation of a weaker paste, which leads
to reduced compressive strengths. Other researches attributes
the decrease in compressive strength to e) the non-homogenous
distribution of rubber particles in the concrete cement paste, that
results in the decrease of the concrete compressive strength [39].
Rubber has a specific gravity lower than concrete constituent com-
ponents. Moreover, over-vibration of the rubberized mixture, lead
to migration of crumb rubber particles to the top surface of
concrete. Besides, f) rubber particles have a hydrophobic (water
repelling) nature, when they are mixed with water [1,30,35,40].
This property of rubber particles entraps air bubbles, which are
attached to them and then takes the bubbles deep into the con-
crete mixture, and that is why it was found that some previous
researchers had reported that the addition of rubber particles to
the concrete mixture increases the air content of the mixture
[1,41]. A noteworthy consequence of the increase in the air content
is the concrete strength reduction [25,26].
 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144 141

3.1.2. Splitting tensile strength
Results of splitting tensile strength of control mixture and rub-
berized geopolymer concrete are shown in (Fig. 8). The strength
reduction for the splitting tensile strength is in trend with that of
the compressive strength. The splitting tensile strength of as high
as (3.60 MPa) was obtained for the control mixture and the
increase of rubber content led to a systematic reduction of splitting
tensile strength. For 10% aggregate replacement, the splitting ten-
sile strength was (2.355 MPa) with losing in strength by 34.60%
compared to control mixture. By increasing crumb rubber content
to 20% then 30%, it noticed that the splitting tensile strengths
decreased by 23% and 35.5% respectively compared to control
mixture
Generally, concrete has very low tensile strength (about ten
percent of the compressive strength) and strain limits. In all cases,
the tensile strength is of an incredible significance to highway, and
airfield slabs design, just as in the event where shear strength and
crack resistance are priority. These deficiencies are exacerbated by
the addition of the crumb rubber to geopolymer concrete (Fig. 8)
where a general tendency exists toward the decrease of the tensile
strength, that might be credited to similar reasons that influence
the compressive strength. Numerous variables are affecting the
relationship between splitting tensile and compressive strength,
including aggregate type, shape, and sieve analysis for the particle
size distribution as well as the curing age [35]. In addition, the rea-
son for the decreased splitting tensile strength might be credited to
the role played by the small particles of rubber in isolating the
aggregate particles between each other and also binder paste lead-
ing to weak adhesion between mixture particles.
3.1.3. Flexural tensile strength (3-Point Loading Test)
As shown by the obtained results in (Fig. 9), the control mixture
had greater flexure force in comparison with other mixtures con-
taining recycled rubber. (Fig. 9) clearly shows that increasing per-
centage of aggregate replacement by crumb rubber to 10% resulted
in reducing the flexure strength up to 20% with flexure force
2.00 KN compared to control mixture. However, by increasing
crumb rubber to 20% then 30% the flexure force was the same value

Fig. 8. Splitting tensile strength for replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates of slag based geopolymer concrete with crumb rubber at 60 days.

Fig. 9. Flexure tensile strength for replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates of slag based geopolymer concrete with crumb rubber at 60 days.
142 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144

1.75 KN with reduction in flexure strength by 30% compared to the energy absorption of the mixture as compared to geopolymer
control mixture. By increasing the percentage of the crumb rubber concrete without crumb rubber replacement. The results (Table 5)
to geopolymer concrete (Fig. 9), There are general tendency exists also showed that increasing the crumb rubber content contributed
toward the reduction of the flexure strength, which may be attrib- to increasing the post cracking resistance; as shown, the difference
uted to the same reasons that affect the compressive strength and between the number of blows for final failure and initial crack (Nf -
the tensile strength.  Ni) increased as the percentage of crumb rubber increased.
(Table 5) also reveal that the impact energy is enhanced by increas-
3.2. Impact resistance of rubberized geopolymer concrete ing percentage of crumb rubber. This finding indicates a reduction
in the brittleness of geopolymer concrete mixes with the increase
3.2.1. Impact resistance under drop weight test in the crumb rubber content.
The impact resistance of rubberized geopolymer concrete for By examining the tested specimens for the failure pattern as
control mixture and three different percentages of replacement seen in (Fig. 11), it can be noticed that the crack pattern at failure
of aggregate by crumb rubber (10%, 20% and 30%) were recorded changed from a single large crack, as seen in the control mix (with-
in terms of numbers of blows required to produce initial visible out crumb rubber) [Fig. 11(a)], to more than one crack in mixtures
crack (Ni) and ultimate failure (Nf) of the specimen. The numbers containing crumb rubber [Fig. 11(b)]. This indicates the beneficial
of blows for 0%–30% replacement of aggregate by crumb rubber effects of crumb rubber replacement on enhancing the ductility
are listed in (Table 5 and Fig. 10). It shown that the number of and performance of concrete under impact loading.
blows, required to cause the initial crack and final crack, increase
significantly with the increase in replacement level of crumb rub-
ber content for all mixtures. The difference between number of
blows for final crack and first crack (Nf-Ni) is also found to increase
significantly with the increase of percentage of replacement of
aggregate for all mixtures. Generally, it could be concluded that
the increase in crumb rubber content increases the impact resis-
tance, for the initial crack as well as for the final crack. Control mix-
tures and geopolymer concrete mixtures with percentages of
crumb rubber in (Table 5) and (Fig. 10) indicated that increasing
the percentage of crumb rubber from 0 to 30% increased (Ni) and
(Nf) by 3.00 and 2.50 times. This increase could be as a result to
the rubber particles low stiffness, which in turn increased the flex-
ibility of the rubber-binder composite and considerably enhanced
Fig. 11. Failure patterns: (a) plain specimen; (b) specimen with crumb rubber.

Table 5
Impact resistance results under drop weight test.

Mix Ni Nf Nf -Ni Impact energy (J)

Mean SD COV Mean SD COV Initial crack Final crack
C 5 2.60 0.53 8 2 0.25 3 100 159
M1 6 1.50 0.33 10 2 0.20 4 120 199
M2 8 3.21 0.54 15 8.54 0.57 7 159 298
M3 20 17.44 0.87 28 15.39 0.55 8 398 557

SD = Standard deviation; COV = Coefficient of variation.

Fig. 10. Impact resistance under drop weight test for replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates of slag based geopolymer concrete with crumb rubber at 60 days.
 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144
Fig. 12. Impact energy under flexural loading for replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates of slag based geopolymer concrete with crumb rubber at 60 days.
Table 6
Impact resistance results under flexural loading.
Mix Nf Impact Energy (J)
C 2 4.90
M1 3 7.40
M2 5 12.30
M3 6 14.70
3.2.2. Impact resistance under flexural loading
(Fig. 12 and Table 6) show the impact energy at failure, under
flexural loading, for control and rubberized geopolymer concrete
mixtures. The rubberized mixtures were prepared using different
percentages of replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates
by crumb rubber (10%, 20% and 30%). It can be seen that the
impact energy for geopolymer concrete significantly improved
with the increase in the percentage of crumb rubber replace-
ment. It is observed that on 30% replacement of fine and coarse
aggregates by crumb rubber, the impact energy of control mix-
ture increases from 4.9 J to 14.7 J with gaining about 200%. This
gaining can be attributed to the low stiffness of the rubber par-
ticles that leads to higher flexibility of rubberized geopolymer
concrete and absorption of considerable amount of impact
energy.
4. Conclusions
This paper focused on the performance of slag based geopoly-
mer concrete with replacement of both fine and coarse aggregates
by different percentages of crumb rubber. From the results out of
the conducted experimental program that had been presented
above, the following conclusion can be drawn:
1. The compressive strength of slag based geopolymer concrete
could be enhanced slightly with the increase in crumb rubber
content up to 10% which can lead to structurally environmen-
tally friendly mixture from by products and wastes with high
compressive strength to be used in structural elements due to
the positive effect of NaOH pre-treatment on crumb rubber par-
ticles against the negative effect of increasing percentage of
crumb rubber on concrete.
143
2. Increasing percentage of crumb rubber more than 10% lead to
decreasing in compressive strength due to the effect of increasing
percentage of crumb rubber on concrete working against the
behaviour of NaOH pre-treatment on crumb rubber particles.
3. The highest splitting tensile and flexural tensile strengths were
obtained from control mixture, and the systematic decrease of
strengths was observed as crumb rubber content increased.
4. The impact resistance of geopolymer concrete significantly
improved due to the rubber particles low stiffness, which in
turn increased the flexibility of the rubber-binder composite
and considerably enhanced the energy absorption of the
mixture as compared to geopolymer concrete without crumb
rubber replacement.
5. The increase in replacement level of crumb rubber led to signif-
icantly increasing the gap between number of blows till the
initial crack and those till the ultimate failure, which indicate
the increase in ductility of rubberized geopolymer concrete.
6. Geopolymer rubberized concrete proved to be a promising
alternative construction material for the Portland cement based
concretes especially those used in the road, and airports paving
slabs for the runways and taxiways.
Conflict of interest
None.
References
[1] Rafat Siddique, Tarun R. Naik, Properties of concrete containing scrap-tire
rubber–an overview, Waste Manage. 24 (6) (2004) 563–569.
[2] Weiguo Shen et al., Investigation on polymer–rubber aggregate modified
porous concrete, Constr. Build. Mater. 38 (2013) 667–674.
[3] F. Azevedo et al., Properties and durability of HPC with tyre rubber wastes,
Constr. Build. Mater. 34 (2012) 186–191.
[4] J.N. Eiras et al., Physical and mechanical properties of foamed Portland cement
composite containing crumb rubber from worn tires, Mater. Des. 59 (2014)
550–557.
[5] Xiang Shu, Baoshan Huang, Recycling of waste tire rubber in asphalt and
Portland cement concrete: an overview, Constr. Build. Mater. 67 (2014) 217–
224.
[6] Yeonho Park et al., Structural performance of dry-cast rubberized concrete
pipes with steel and synthetic fibers, Constr. Build. Mater. 77 (2015) 218–226.
[7] Lijuan Li, Shenghua Ruan, Lan Zeng, Mechanical properties and constitutive
equations of concrete containing a low volume of tire rubber particles, Constr.
Build. Mater. 70 (2014) 291–308.
[8] Chandra, Bora Mukul. ‘‘Sustainable concrete with scrap tyre aggregate.”
(2010).
144 A.M. Aly et al. / Construction and Building Materials 207 (2019) 136–144
[9] Miguel Bravo, Jorge de Brito, Concrete made with used tyre aggregate:
durability-related performance, J. Cleaner Prod. 25 (2012) 42–50.
[10] Bashar S. Mohammed et al., Properties of crumb rubber hollow concrete block,
J. Cleaner Prod. 23 (1) (2012) 57–67.
[11] Neil N. Eldin, Ahmed B. Senouci, Measurement and prediction of the strength
of rubberized concrete, Cem. Concr. Compos. 16 (4) (1994) 287–298.
[12] A. Benazzouk et al., Physico-mechanical properties of aerated cement
composites containing shredded rubber waste, Cem. Concr. Compos. 28 (7)
(2006) 650–657.
[13] Zaher K. Khatib, Fouad M. Bayomy, Rubberized Portland cement concrete, J.
Mater. Civ. Eng. 11 (3) (1999) 206–213.
[14] Houssam A. Toutanji, The use of rubber tire particles in concrete to replace
mineral aggregates, Cem. Concr. Compos. 18 (2) (1996) 135–139.
[15] Camille A. Issa, George Salem, Utilization of recycled crumb rubber as fine
aggregates in concrete mix design, Constr. Build. Mater. 42 (2013) 48–52.
[16] Yeonho Park et al., Flexural characteristic of rubberized hybrid concrete
reinforced with steel and synthetic fibers, Adv. Civ. Eng. Mater. 3 (1) (2014)
495–508.
[17] F. Hernandez-Olivares et al., Static and dynamic behaviour of recycled tyre
rubber-filled concrete, Cem. Concr. Res. 32 (10) (2002) 1587–1596.
[18] Fernando Pacheco-Torgal, Introduction to handbook of alkali-activated
cements, mortars and concretes, in: Handbook of alkali-activated cements,
mortars and concretes, 2015, pp. 1–16.
[19] E. Ivan Diaz-Loya, Erez N. Allouche, Saiprasad Vaidya, Mechanical properties of
fly ash-based geopolymer concrete, ACI Mater. J. 108 (3) (2011) 300–306.
[20] V.M. Malhotra, Introduction: sustainable development and concrete
technology, Concr. Int. 24 (2002) 7.
[21] Joseph Davidovits (Ed.), Geopolymer, green chemistry and sustainable
development solutions: proceedings of the world congress geopolymer 2005,
Geopolymer Institute, 2005.
[22] Al Bakri, Mohd Mustafa, et al., Review on fly ash-based geopolymer concrete
without Portland Cement, J. Eng. Technol. Res. 3 (1) (2011) 1–4.
[23] Djwantoro Hardjito et al., On the development of fly ash-based geopolymer
concrete, Mater. J. 101 (6) (2004) 467–472.
[24] J. Davidovits, Chemistry of Geopolymeric Systems, Terminology, in:
Proceedings of 99 International Conference. eds. Joseph Davidovits, R.
Davidovits & C. James, France (1999).
[25] Paulo Monteiro, Concrete, Microstructure, Properties, and Materials, McGraw-
Hill Publishing, 2006.
[26] Adam M. Neville, J.J. Brooks, Concrete Technology. 2010, Pearson Education
Limited, Essex, England, 1987.
[27] P.R. Rangaraju, S. Gadkar, Durability evaluation of crumb rubber addition rate
on Portland cement concrete, Department Civ. Eng., Clemson Univ., Clemson
(2012) 1–126.
[28] L. Zheng, X. Sharon Huo, Y. Yuan, Strength, modulus of elasticity, and
brittleness index of rubberized concrete, J. Mater. Civ. Eng. 20 (11) (2008)
692–699.
[29] Trilok Gupta, Ravi K. Sharma, Sandeep Chaudhary, Impact resistance of
concrete containing waste rubber fiber and silica fume, Int. J. Impact Eng. 83
(2015) 76–87.
[30] Reda Taha, M. Mahmoud, et al., Mechanical, fracture, and microstructural
investigations of rubber concrete, J. Mater. Civ. Eng. 20 (10) (2008) 640–649.
[31] Trilok Gupta, Sandeep Chaudhary, Ravi K. Sharma, Assessment of mechanical
and durability properties of concrete containing waste rubber tire as fine
aggregate, Constr. Build. Mater. 73 (2014) 562–574.
[32] Bashar S. Mohammed, N.J. Azmi, Strength reduction factors for structural
rubbercrete, Front. Struct. Civ. Eng. 8 (3) (2014) 270–281.
[33] Morteza Khorrami et al., Experimental lnvestigation on mechanical
characteristics and environmental effects on rubber concrete, Int. J. Concr.
Struct. Mater. 4 (1) (2010) 17–23.
[34] Shuai Tian, Tong Zhang, Ye Li, Research on modifier and modified process for
rubber-particle used in rubberized concrete for road, Adv. Mater. Res. 243
(2011). Trans Tech Publications.
[35] Osama Youssf, M.A. Elgawady, An Overview of Sustainable Concrete Made
with Scrap Rubber, Diss. CRC Press, 2013.
[36] Osama Youssf, Julie E. Mills, Reza Hassanli, Assessment of the mechanical
performance of crumb rubber concrete, Constr. Build. Mater. 125 (2016) 175–
183.
[37] Neil N. Eldin, Ahmed B. Senouci, Rubber-tire particles as concrete aggregate, J.
Mater. Civ. Eng. 5 (4) (1993) 478–496.
[38] Yue Li, Min Wang, Zhanguo Li, Physical and mechanical properties of Crumb
Rubber Mortar (CRM) with interfacial modifiers, J. Wuhan University Technol.
Mater. Sci. Ed. 25 (5) (2010) 845–848.
[39] A.C. Ho, A. Turatsinze, D.C. Vu, On the potential of rubber aggregates obtained
by grinding end-of-life tyres to improve the strain capacity of concrete, in:
Concrete repair, rehabilitation and retrofitting II, CRC Press, 2008, pp. 113–
114.
[40] Alan Richardson et al., ‘‘Freeze/thaw performance of concrete using granulated
rubber crumb, J. Green Build. 6 (1) (2011) 83–92.
[41] Ali R. Khaloo, M. Dehestani, P. Rahmatabadi, Mechanical properties of concrete
containing a high volume of tire–rubber particles, Waste Manage. 28 (12)
(2008) 2472–2482.