Dielectric Properties and Temperature Profile
Dielectric Properties and Temperature Profile
Dielectric Properties and Temperature Profile
a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Available online 4 December 2010 In this paper, the fresh properties, dielectric properties and temperature prole of y ash-based geopolymer
mortars are investigated to observe the effect of mixture proportions and time after mixing. Sodium
Keywords: hydroxide (NaOH) and sodium silicate (Na2SiO3) were used as the activators. The results of fresh properties
Dielectric properties revealed that the added water could improve the workability of geopolymer mortar. It is also found that the
Geopolymer initial and nal setting times of all the geopolymer mortars are less than those of cement mortars. For the
Workability
dielectric properties and surface temperature, mortars were measured during a 24-hours geopolymerisation
Setting time
Microwave energy
period at room temperature. The obtained results show that dielectric properties and surface temperature of
geopolymer mortars tended to decrease with increasing time after mixing. And the geopolymer mortars had
the highest value of dielectric properties and surface temperature at right after mixing. In addition, the
dielectric properties (r' and r) of the specimens with more liquid constituents were also higher. In
particular, this work shows that it is possible to cure the y ash-based geopolymer mortars with microwave
energy depending on the mixture proportion and time after mixing.
2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
0735-1933/$ see front matter 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.icheatmasstransfer.2010.11.020
S. Jumrat et al. / International Communications in Heat and Mass Transfer 38 (2011) 242248 243
The objectives of this research are to study the inuences of both In this study, the ow table of geopolymer mortar was studied.
the time after mixing and mix proportions to the fresh and the Because the ow table test indicates the workability of the fresh
dielectric properties of y ash-based geopolymer during a 24-hours mortar as according to ASTM C 109 standard. The workable ow of
geopolymerisation period. In addition, its surface temperature is geopolymer mortar was in the range of 110 5%. The details of each
observed since it is well known that complex dielectric properties are mixture of geopolymer mortar for ow test are given in Table 1.
temperature dependent.
2.6. Setting time test
2. Materials and methods
As for cement paste, the geopolymer mortar specimens with added
In this section, the details of material, mixture proportion and water to meet ow values according to ASTM standard were tested for
mixing and casting to prepare the geopolymer mortar are shown. setting time by using the Vicat needle apparatus in accordance with
ASTM C 191 standard.
2.1. Materials In order to study the effect of the time after mixing before heat
curing on dielectric properties geopolymer, the cast specimens were
The constituents of geopolymer mortar were y ash, sodium wrapped with vinyl sheet to prevent moisture loss and kept in
hydroxide (NaOH) solution, sodium silicate (Na2SiO3) solution, sand laboratory at room temperature of 2829 C. Then the dielectric
and tap water. Lignite y ash (FA) from Mae Moh power station in properties of geopolymer mortars were measured over 24 h after
Thailand was used as a source material. The chemical composition of mixing. The detailed testing of the dielectric properties is explained in
y ash was 36.4% SiO2, 20.5% Al2O3, 15.8% Fe2O3, 16.4% CaO, 3.6% MgO, Sections 2.7.
2.3% K2O, 0.9% Na2O, 3.4% SO3, 0% TiO2 and 1.2% Free CaO. The specic
surface area (Blaine) of y ash was 2133 cm2/g. Sodium hydroxide 2.7. Dielectric property measurement
solutions of 10 M concentration were prepared by dissolving NaOH
pellets in tap water. Sodium silicate solution with composition of In order to analyze the feasibility of using microwave energy
28.75 SiO2 wt.%, 9.58 Na2O wt.%, and 61.67 wt.% water was also used. application to cure geopolymer, the dielectric properties were studied
River sand passed sieve No. 16 (1.18 mm opening) and retained on to obtain the relative dielectric constant (r) and the relative dielectric
No. 100 sieve (150 m opening) with neness modulus of 2.8 and loss factor (r). These dielectric properties demonstrate the absorb-
specic gravity of 2.65 was used. ability of microwave energy and the productivity of heating generated
from microwave energy.
2.2. Mixture proportions The open-ended probe technique was employed for measuring the
dielectric properties of constituents and mortar of geopolymer. This
Nine mixtures of geopolymer mortar were prepared. The para- technique, by itself, calculated the dielectric properties from the phase
meters of geopolymer mortar are as follows: and amplitude of the reected signal at the end of an open-ended
coaxial line, which was inserted into a specimen measured by a
1) The weight ratios of y ash-to-alkaline solution (FA/AS) were 2.0
portable network analyzer, as shown in Fig. 1. The analyzer consists of
and 2.5
a coaxial cavity, microwave reectometer, 0.35-cm coaxial cable,
2) The weight ratios of sodium silicate-to-sodium hydroxide solution
0.35-cm female calibration, and short-and open-matched load and
(NS/NH) were 0.5, 1.0 and 2.0.
All geopolymer mortars were made with the weight ratios of 2.0
sand-to-y ash. Table 1
Mixture proportions of geopolymer mortar for ow test.
0 3 5 8 10 13 15 18 20 23
2.8. Temperature measurement
1) 2.0FA0.5 42 112 152 NA
2) 2.0FA1.0 27 61 110 245 NA
After casting (time after mixing at 0 h), the surface temperature of 3) 2.0FA2.0 NA 15 32 81 107 139 NA
geopolymer mortars are measured by using an infrared thermometer. 4) 2.5FA0.5 NA 23 67 113 152 NA
This conguration facilitates temperature measurement from a 5) 2.5FA1.0 NA 18 42 86 105 151 NA
distance without contact with the sample to be measured. Then, the 6) 2.5FA2.0 NA NA NA 19 34 75 105 148 NA
test specimens and moulds were wrapped with vinyl sheet to prevent Flow (%) were in accordance with ASTM C 109.
S. Jumrat et al. / International Communications in Heat and Mass Transfer 38 (2011) 242248 245
Fig. 2. Amount of required added water in geopolymer mortar for the ow to meet
ASTM C 109 standard. Fig. 3. Setting times of geopolymer mortars at various mixture proportions.
result of improved dissolution of the y ash into alkaline liquid; 3.4. Dielectric properties of mortar
leading to improved polymerisation and hardening of the gel phase
[17]. Therefore this study only investigated setting time of the Consequently, the dielectric properties of geopolymer mortars are
specimens with added water to reach the standard ow. The strongly affected by their constituents and mix proportion character-
mixtures are given in Table 2 which have symbol of (*), namely istics. In this section, the inuences of time after mixing and mixture
2.0FA0.5 + 3%, 2.0FA1.0 + 5%, 2.0FA2.0 + 10%, 2.5FA0.5 + 8%, proportions on the dielectric properties of geopolymer mortars are
2.5FA1.0 + 10% and 2.5FA2.0 + 15%. discussed.
From the tested results, it shows that y ash-based geopolymer
mortars with added water were not hardened immediately at room 3.4.1. Effect of time after mixing
temperature. As seen in Fig. 3, the initial and nal setting times are For dielectric properties of geopolymer mortar, the variations
hardly affected by the weight ratio of FA/AS and NS/NH. The setting of r and r with time after mixing are given in Figs. 4 and 5,
time decreases when the weight ratio of FA/AS and NS/NH increase. respectively. It can be seen that both values of r and r for all
For example, the 2.0FA0.5 + 3% and 2.5FA0.5 + 8% have initial setting specimens are the highest at right after mixing. After that all the
times of 82 and 52 min, respectively, and the nal setting times of data show the decrease of the r and r as a function of the time
106 and 78 min, respectively. This result has been reported by Provis after mixing. This decreasing is strong at the 3 h rst-geopolymer-
and van Deventer [18] that the specimens with higher weight ratio isation period and then slow down. Until the values of r and r are
of solid materials-to-alkaline solution created more geopolymerisa- the lowest at 24 h after mixing. This is because, in the early stages of
tion than other specimens. The explanation of this result is that the the reaction, geopolymer composes of a large amount of free water
weight ratio of FA/AS affects geopolymerisation reaction since this and monomers as the main compositions [20] as shown in semi-
reaction requires SiO2 and Al2O3 in y ash [4]. The specimens with schematic structure for geopolymer in Fig. 6. As mentioned in the
greater amount of y ash have higher geopolymerisation reaction early stages of the reaction, the speed of formation of dissolved
and rapid development of the internal structure. Thus, the setting monomers is greater than the speed of precipitation of the gel. The
time becomes lower. water and monomer are high lossy material corresponding to with
higher than that of the other components [10]. For any mixture,
3.3. Dielectric properties of constituents the values of r and r decrease with increasing time, as expected.
Because the free water and monomers in the early stages are
Table 3 demonstrates the dielectric properties of constituents. The transformed into bound water and polymer components, respec-
results show that constituents can be separated into two groups tively which these components absorb microwave energy less than
including the following: free water and monomer. And the bound water is tightly held and
less rotationally free than the free water which makes higher
(a) The water-based material group consists of water and alkaline dielectric losses possible [21]. In other words, the structure and
solution (Na2SiO3 and NaOH (10 M)). It has a reasonably wide chemical compositions of geopolymer are changed dramatically at
range of both properties (r and r). This is because water is a the early stages of mixing process and decrease steadily after
high lossy material corresponding to with r and r much mixing time of 1 hour. However the r of the mortar during a 1 hour
higher than that of the other components [19]. This effect rst-period has a wide variation that is greater that its dielectric
shows clearly in alkaline solution that consists mainly of water
and polymer.
Table 3
(b) The solid material group comprises y ash and sand (saturated Dielectric properties of geopolymer mortar constituents.
surface-dry). This group shows a narrow range of dielectric
constant (r) and dielectric loss factor (r). The dielectric Material Relative dielectric Relative dielectric loss
constant (r) factor (r)
properties of this group are narrower than those of the water-
based material group. This is caused by the facts that liquid Fly ash 2.90 0.21
Sand 2.78 0.20
constituents contain water is a polar molecule and the HOH
(Saturated surface-dry)
bonding angle is not straight. This means that it can be easily Sodium silicate 8.94 1.70
polarized by an electric eld and this is the main characteristic (Na2SiO3)
of a good dielectric [10]. But y ash and sand have less polarity Sodium hydroxide 14.32 1.17
than that of water molecules, and thus become less affected by (NaOH, 10 M)
Water (27 C) 72.18 11.75
the forces generated by the alternating electromagnetic elds.
246 S. Jumrat et al. / International Communications in Heat and Mass Transfer 38 (2011) 242248
Fig. 4. Variation in dielectric constant with time after mixing. Fig. 6. Proposed semi-schematic structure for Na-polysialate polymer [14].
constant r; this is due to having a high variation and it is related to distribution and the mineral composition of the starting y ash, the
the conductivity of a material's polarization and relaxation type and concentration of the activator, etc. [24]. After 4 h of
behaviors [19]. By the physical (gasliquidsolid) phase undoubt- geopolymerisation period, it not shows clearly for variation of
edly has an effect upon the dielectric properties of materials. Liquids dielectric properties with the ratio of FA/AS and NS/NH. However,
may exhibit much higher values of dielectric constant and loss in next study, moisture measurement is important since the internal
factor than if they are present in the solid state [22]. moisture transport is mainly attributable to capillary ow of liquid
water through the voids during the initial stage of drying [25].
3.4.2. Effect of mixture proportions
Consideration of mixture proportions, it can be seen that at right 3.5. Temperature of mortars
after mixing, the increasing weight ratio of FA/AS and NS/NH
decrease the r values of mortars. All specimens with the ratio of Since geopolymerisation is exothermic [4], the release heat during
FA/AS of 2.0 have the r more than FA/AS of 2.5 specimens. These its geopolymerisation is translated into an important temperature
values have been shown to be correlated with liquid constituents increase from which the heat quantity developed can be evaluated.
content (added water and alkaline solution (Na2SiO3 + NaOH)). The The temperature evolution prole during a 24-hours geopolymerisa-
amount of added water and alkaline solution that were used to tion period at room temperature of all geopolymer mortars are
produce geopolymer mortars as shown in Fig. 7. This is the r value of displayed in Fig. 8. The results show that the temperature of mortars is
mortar with high liquid constituents content is higher than the the highest at right after mixing and decreased with time after mixing.
mortar with less liquid content. This agrees with the results of This decreasing is strong at the 3 h rst-geopolymerisation period and
constituents in Section 3.3 that shown liquid constituents contain then slow down. This result is in agreement with those data from
water has the high values of dielectric properties. It is important to conduction calorimetry testing reported by Palomo et al. [26] that
note that the dielectric properties of geopolymer mortars are shows a rapid and intense release of heat when y ashes and alkalis
strongly inuenced by water content. The water content has a get in contact), as well as the analytical data published by van
substantial effect on the nal properties of the geopolymer [23]. At Deventer et al. (who found the existence of a type of synchronism
right after mixing, not only the r but also the r values decrease correlating the Al and Si dissolution rate in a number of silicoalumi-
with increasing the ratio of FA/AS while it not indicates clearly for nate minerals) [23], conrm for the alkali activation of y ashes a
variation of the r values with the ratio of NS/NH. This is due to the similar process to that of hydration of Portland cement during the rst
variation of the chemical composition of reaction products and the moments of the hydration. For mixture proportions, it can be seen
complex of the internal structure of geopolymer. As the activation that at right after mixing, the increasing weight ratio of FA/AS and NS/
reaction rate as well as the chemical composition of the reaction NH decrease the temperature of mortars. These results agree with
products depend on several factors like for example the particle size
Fig. 5. Variation in dielectric loss factor with time after mixing. Fig. 7. Amount of added water and alkaline solution in geopolymer mortar.
S. Jumrat et al. / International Communications in Heat and Mass Transfer 38 (2011) 242248 247
previous work that reported at high sodium silicate content, its effect
became dominant and the effect of leaching of y ash was less, thus it
lead to decreased polymerization.
In addition, the results indicated that the variation of the surface
temperature with time after mixing is similar to the variation of the
dielectric properties (r and r) as shown in Figs. 9 and 10,
respectively. However, in a previous report [27], the dielectric loss
factor increased with increasing temperature. It is important to note
that the variation of the dielectric constant with temperature is much
less important than its variation with free water content [2830].
Fig. 10. Variation of dielectric loss factor and temperature with time after mixing.
(a) Specimens with weight ratios of FA/AS equal to 2.0 and (b) Specimens with weight
ratios of FA/AS equal to 2.5.
4. Conclusions
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