Impedance spectroscopy measurement of metakaolin-based alkali-activated building materials

Cement-containing as well as cement-free building materials are regarded as dielectrics. Therefore, electrically conducting admixtures are to be added to them in order to increase their electrical conductivity. Steel or carbon fibres, metal powder, graphite, carbon soot or carbon nanotubes are commonly used for this purpose. The conductivity increase offers new application options, such as sensor property materials, self-heated materials, or electromagnetic smog shielding materials. The specimens of the mixes to be studied were subjected to an electrical analysis carried out within the frequency range from 100 MHz to 3 GHz by means of an ZNC vector analyser and an SPEAG-made DAK-12 coaxial probe and, furthermore, a dedicated automatically measuring device operating within the frequency range from 40 Hz to 1 MHz. The frequency spectra of interest were measured on various copolymer specimens differing from each other by the content of graphite and carbon nanotubes. Higher content of these admixtures increases the electrical conductivity and the building materials thus become easier to measure by means of electromagnetic measuring methods.