37º IAHS World Congress on Housing: - Universidad de Cantabria

XXXVII <strong>IAHS</strong><strong>World</strong> <strong>Congress</strong> on HousingOctober 26 – 29, 2010, Santander, SpainCODE: 101CONCRETE USING COCONUT SHELL AS COARSELIGTHWEIGHT AGGREGATEOrdoñez-Belloc L.M.*, Aliques-Granero J., Girbés-Clarí I., Martínez-Barea R., Faus-Badía A.,González-Navarrete L., Franch-Coronil V.*Materials Research Technical UnitAIDICO, Paterna (Spain)e-mail: luismiguel.ordonez@aidico.esKeywords: coconut shell, lightweight aggregate, lightweight concrete, sustainability, agriculturalwasteAbstractThe high cost of conventional building materials is a major factor affecting housing deliveryin some development countries. This has necessitated research into alternative materials ofconstruction. This paper presents the results of an investigation carried out on the comparativeof fresh and hardens characteristics of concrete produced with crushed coconut shell (CCS) assubstitute for conventional coarse aggregate. CCS was characterized by means of grading,water absorption, density and packing analysis. Concretes with different mix designs wereobtained using different volumes of CCS: 0%, 32%, 60% and 100%. The performance ofconcrete was evaluated using different tests such as workability, density, compressive andflexural strength, static modulus of elasticity, splitting tensile strength, water permeability,autogenous and drying shrinkage. Even although performance of concrete decreased as thepercentage of CCS increases, lightweight concretes (