EXPLORATORY STUDY ON PARTIAL REPLACEMENT OF COARSE AGGREGATE BY TALIPOT PALM SEED

The increasing demand for construction materials have led to depletion of available resources of aggregates. Various alternatives for aggregates have been studied and partially replaced, though not fully replaced in concrete making. This study attempted to use Talipot palm seed as partial replacement for coarse aggregate in concrete. The seed has no other usage other than to be disposed as waste. The seeds were found to be abundantly available in villages, which was collected and used for this study. The properties of the Talipot palm seeds were found to be: Light in weight, very low crushing strength, low impact value. Each seed is 18mm in size and weighs 4 grams. The first try was to use the seeds without crushing. This was attempted in M20 grade concrete and the replacement was of the order of 10% and 20%. It was observed that on the seventh day of curing the concrete cubes partially replaced with Talipot palm seeds showed prominent cracks all over the surface of the cubes. All the specimens showed the same phenomena of cracks, which indicated that the seeds lacked in binding property when used without crushing since it had smooth surface. The second trial was to crush the seeds and then replace of the order of 10% and 20% for coarse aggregate in concrete. When the seeds were crushed and used it was found that the specimens did not develop any cracks after curing. When tested for the compressive strength, the strength values were almost equal to that of the conventional concrete. The study attempted to investigate the possibility of usage of the Talipot Palm seeds as an alternative for coarse aggregate, which was successful in terms of compressive strength, but the durability factor needs to be studied in the longer term, to successfully implement it practically.