Effect of Accelerated Curing Regimes on High Volume Fly Ash Mixtures in Precast Manufacturing Plants

Fly ash is becoming a common replacement for cement in concrete. Not only does it reduce CO2 emissions, but it is cost effective and often times improves various fresh and hardened properties of concrete. Currently, Fly ash isn\u27t replaced in percentages greater than 25-35% in structural applications because of the delayed concrete setting time. This study presents an experimental investigation to evaluate the performance of mortar mixtures incorporating up to 70% cement replacement with Fly ash under the effect of accelerated curing. Different accelerated curing regimes were investigated in terms of the preset time, curing temperature, and curing time. Fresh and hardened properties of HVFA mortar mixtures were obtained for three replacement level and their results were compared at different ages. The accelerated curing regimes successfully developed high early-age strength mixtures that can be used in the precast industry. Some curing regimes revealed the ability to reduce energy as well as curing time