 What is curing

 Need of Curing
Curing can be defined as a procedure for insuring the
hydration of the Portland cement in newly-placed
concrete. It generally implies control of moisture loss
and sometimes of temperature.
Results due to poor curing
 Inadequate strength.

 Drying shrinkage and cracks at high temperatures

Methods of Curing
 Immersion
 Ponding
 Spraying
 Covering with wet sand
 Wetted Hessian (gunny bags)
 Membrane curing
 Steam curing
• Wet covering: such as wet gunny bags, hessian cloth, jute
matting, straw etc., are wrapped to vertical surface for keeping
the concrete wet.
Membrane Curing
 Acute shortage of water.

 Curing create conditions for promotion of uninterrupted and

progressive hydration.

 Prevent loss of water, membrane can be applied to seal off the

evaporation of water.

 Curing compound is an obvious choice for curing canal lining,

sloping roofs and textured surface of concrete pavements.

 No doubt that curing compounds are not as efficient and as ideal

as water curing. The efficiency of curing compounds can be at
best be 80% of water curing
Methods of accelerated curing
1) the use of physical processes, and

2) the use of admixtures to act as catalysts for the

hydration process
Physical Process
 Conductive/convective heating, electrical resistance
heating, and steam curing (low and high pressure).

Use of admixtures in order to accelerate:

 Use of mineral admixtures
 Chemical admixtures
Physical process
 To an extent, an increased curing temperature will
result in an increased rate of strength gain.

 Beyond a certain point, increases in temperature not

only prove to be less efficient, but can actually be
detrimental to the properties of the concrete.

 A typical maximum curing temperature used in

commercial precast plants is 160 F
Conduction/Convection Used for
Accelerated Curing:
 Temperature of the forms increased
 Electricity in the formwork
 By pumping hot oil
 Hot water through them
 Sufficient humidity should be provided to prevent
drying of the concrete
Electrical Resistance Curing:
 Dissipation of heat through electrical resistance
 fresh concrete has an electrical resistivity of
approximately 100 ohms-meter
 reinforcement or additional wires are used as resistors.
Low-Pressure Steam Curing:
 curing temperatures is elevated
 Moisture is added during curing
 initial delay period of 3 to 4 hrs
 heating period with a temperature rise of 40 to 60
F/hr.
 Maximum Curing temperature is 140 to 160 F.
 Followed by a steaming period lasting for 6 hrs while
maintaining curing temperature.
 Cooling period.
High-Pressure Steam Curing
(Autoclaving):
 Curing is done in an enclosed vesel
 This restriction limits the use of the technique to
relatively small elements.
MINERAL ADMIXTURES FOR
ACCELERATING CURING:
 Microsilica, or silica fume, is an extremely reactive,
pozzolanic material
 Cement replacement is done
 Combination of heat cured concrete with the addition
of microsilica has much higher early strength
 Fly ash can be used as cement replacement.
 Unlike mircrosilica, however, fly ash does not result in
improved early strength of concrete.
CHEMICAL ADMIXTURES FOR
ACCELERATING CURING:
 Calcium (Calcium chloride)
 Superplasticizer - High range water reducer