What You Need to Know About Cement Quality Cement is an essential component of concrete and mortar. It is an important building material found in sidewalks, structures, and roads throughout the world. Cement is critical to the extent that if it is of low-quality cracks, premature failure, and an unsafe project will be the result. However, high-quality cement will prevent the aforementioned issues and make structures durable, strong, and safe for a long time.
What you need to know about Concrete Most time, people mistakenly use the term mortar, concrete, and cement interchangeably. Mortar is a combination of a fine aggregate and cement. It is usually used for bonding bricks or other components in structural applications. However, concrete is a composite material, which is formed by mixing aggregates like crushed stone, gravel, sand, water, and cement. Though hardly used on its own, cement is a binder that hardens and sets. Nevertheless, when cement is mixed with aggregates, it forms mortar or concrete and used in binding other materials. Cement is more of a generic term, which refers to one of many distinct formulations. You may have heard of Portland cement but didn’t know what its constituents are. Well, Portland cement is a combination of calcium, silicon, aluminum, and iron oxide materials. Today, it is the common cement for concrete applications today. However, there are other types of cement such as carbon bond, calcium aluminate, polymer bond, slag, phosphate, epoxy, and much more.
Different Cement Grade Ordinary Portland cement (OPC) comes in different standard grades, which can be specified when buying. For general construction jobs in normal environmental conditions, the best option is 33 Grade OPC. However, 43 Grade OPC is used primarily for foundations, brickwork, plastering, and compound walls in home construction. The last grade, which is the 53 grade OPC, offers durability and high strength for structures such as concrete roads, runways, bridges, skyscrapers, and heavy-duty constructions.
After selecting the particular grade that is suitable for the job, you have to ensure that the cement is from a reputable seller. Don’t buy cement without machine stitches and doesn’t have the brand name of the manufacturers on them.
Post-Purchase Inspection Before buying any cement product, ensure it is up to the industry standards. However, some find it out to know how to inspect cement products before buying it. Well, this section will give you a little insight into checking the quality of cement products.
Packaging When buying, verify the stitches of the bag are intact and the back doesn’t have holes. Furthermore, look for certification marks such as ISI or CE as it will help you to ascertain if it meets up with the standards. Remember, the strength of cement degrades over time so inquire when it was produced.
Look and Feel If the packaging is okay, you can scoop a little to be sure it doesn’t have a lump and cool when touched. Also, look at the color because a good cement should have a uniform greenish-gray color.
Water Tests A quality cement will float when tossed into a bucket of water especially if it is free from impurities. The cement must float on the surface before sinking. You can mix some with water to form a paste to know if it hardens correctly. If after 24 hours it retains the shape, then it is a good cement.
Smell If the cement has an earthy smell, it may contain too much clay and silt.
Author’s Bio Samuel Champ talks about how one can know the quality of the cement product. He gave important ways of knowing how to ascertain if a cement product is a high quality or not.