Innovative reusable lightweight cement blocks

Abstract

The cement blocks are a prefabricated material mainly used to build masonry walls in construction industry. Self-weight of units, workmanship and construction time are key factors affecting the masonry wall construction. The constructing of walls, ensure that the cement blocks are properly aligned with one another and need the skilled and highly paid masons for these masonry works. Considering these facts, the interlocking block masonry offer great advantage in masonry construction. The main feature of this interlocking block system is elimination of mortar layer with the tongue and groove method of the interlocking block. The demand of natural sand in the construction industry has increased due to the reduction of sources and an increase in price. Although, the self-weight of the structure can be reduced by introducing the hollow nature for the masonry blocks and also cost of the construction materials can be reduced due to the reduction of volume of the cement block. The goal in any interlocking system is to ensure efficient construction formation with well aligned masonry structures without skilled masons. Therefore, construction cost can be reduced due to the low skilled workers. Furthermore, the interlocking nature of these innovative blocks can be used for the reusable block. This paper presents an experimental investigation was carried out to introduce a new shape of cement block with interlocking behaviour for masonry wall construction, to fulfil the above-mentioned requirements. The interlocking hollow blocks developed were 390mm × 200mm × 190mm in size with a weight of 21.05 kg. The experimental investigation has shown that average compressive strength of block was 3.25N/mm2 and wall panel strength was 0.93N/mm2, therefore it can be used for load bearing masonry walls. It was also observed the innovative block is economical than conventional blocks.