Design and Assessment of a Lightweight Polymer Concrete Utility Manhole

LEIZEROW, TOMAS; VAZQUEZ, ANALÍA; PIQUE, TERESA M.; BERNAL, CELINA; LEONARDI, LUCIANO; BALZAMO, HUMBERTO; AGALIOTIS, ELIANA

Advances in Materials Science and Engineering

Hindawi

Año: 2019 vol. 2019 p. 1 - 12

1687-8434

Polymer concrete is a composite using polymer insteadof portland cement as a binder. It allows optimizing the tensile and crackingstrength and the chemical resistance of a concrete structure. In this study,different formulations were assessed in order to optimize a polymer concreteunderground utility manhole with minimum weight. Formulations were based on anepoxy-amine system mixed with fine regular-weight aggregates and ultralightweightaggregates. The objective was to design and assess an underground utilitystructure with the epoxy chemical resistance, strength, and lightweight and tostudy whether the replacement of regular-weight aggregates by ultralightweightaggregates would contribute to improve the strength and reduce the structure weight.Two polymer concrete systems were designed from its formulation, and theirmechanical performance was evaluated experimentally. A numerical model wasdeveloped for a polymer concrete underground utility structure made from thedifferent formulations. It was simplified as a box subjected to typical soilloads. The size of the box is a standard one. Its minimum Wall thickness isspecified for sustaining the in-use service pressures obtained from numericalsimulation. The model predicted that the epoxy/regular-weight aggregateformulation could be used with a wall thickness significantly smaller than theformulation with ultralightweight aggregates. In addition, the undergroundutility structure made with this formulation would weigh six times less thanthe same box made with a traditional portland cement concrete.