An investigation of the effect of PVA and boric acid on concrete mixtures

Abstract

In this study, we investigate the effect of the addition of poly vinyl alcohol (PVA), a polymer filler, which is known to promote the strength of unit mass, corrosion strength and the flexibility of the final product together with boric acid as a cross linking agent to concrete polymer composites by viscosity, setting time, compressive and bending strength tests in accordance with Turkish standards. The addition of PVA and boric acid caused 4% increase in 28 days’ compressive strength results. The bending strength on the other hand, the bending strength decreased by 45%. The samples were also investigated by scanning electron microscope (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) methods. The experiments repeated with higher filler concentrations showed that porosity of the final concrete was significantly decreased resulting a much higher quality end product.