Effect of Cockele Shells on Mortars Performance in Extreme Conditions

This paper studies the use of cockle shell as supplementary cementitious materials SCMs as substitute for cement. The cockle shells generally have a high CaO content which can alter the behavior and the properties of mortars and concrete. Cockle shell is used with weight ratios of 5, 10, 15 and 20% to formulate a mortar with cockle shell and a control mortar CM with 0% of cockle shell. The properties in the fresh state, the mechanical strength and the weight loss test as well as the depth of penetration of each mixture were carried out through the conducted experiments. Consistency and density of fresh mortars were determined, the results obtained showed that cockle shell have a significant influence on the properties of mortars in the fresh state.

The different results of hardened mortars show that the introduction of cockle shell tends to accelerate the development kinetics of strength at the young age but its ratio cannot be above of 5%. Mortar with 10% presented the lower depth penetration, the loss weight increased proportionally with the increasing of cockle shell amount.