A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Engineering in Structural Engineering, School of Engineering and Technology

Thesis (M.Eng.) - Asian Institute of Technology, 2009

Ferrocement is a shell type of structure. The shell membrane tensile stress is a very important parameter in designing structures, and tensile strength of ferrocement is a main concern The tensile strength degrades due to corrosion of its reinforcement. To preserve the tensile strength in corrosive environment, some modifications to the design were introduced in mineral admixtures and the number of wire mesh layers. Different corrosive conditions, namely mild, moderate and severe, were achieved by an electro-chemical based accelerated corrosion technique. The mineral admixtures used were fly ash, silica fume and metakaolin. And, the numbers of wire mesh layers used were 2, 4 and 6 with middle skeleton reinforcement. The thickness of specimen was limited to 30 mm and water/cement ratio was kept as 0.35. The test results were analyzed based on, weight loss in skeleton reinforcement, first crack load, maximum load capacity and load-displacement variation. Based on the analysis, it was found that performance of ferrocement improves when increased the number of wire mesh layers and matrix properties enhanced. Furthermore, it was also found that, in general, 20% fly ash, 10% silica fume and 20% metakaolin replacements were effective. Within these, 10% silica fume replacement was the most effective.