Mechanical Behavior of Steel-Chips-Reinforced Concrete

This work is a part of an industrial waste development program. It is devoted to the study of recyclability of chips resulting from the machining of steel parts as reinforcement for concrete. We are particularly interested in this study in the rheological behavior of chips reinforced fresh concrete and its mechanical behavior at young age. The evaluation of the workability indicates that the sand over gravel optimal ratios (S/G), corresponding to the composite minimum flow time, are S/G = 0.8 and S/G = 1. The study of the chips content (W) influence on the workability of the concrete shows that the flow time and the optimal ratio S/G increase with W. Mechanical characterization tests (direct tension, compression, bending and splitting) show that mechanical properties of chips reinforced concrete are comparable to those of the two selected reference concretes (concrete reinforced with conventional fibers: EUROSTEEL fibers corrugated and DRAMIX fibers). Chips provide to control concrete a significant increase in strength and some ductility in the post-failure behavior of the composite. Recycling chips as reinforcement for concrete could be thus favorably considered.