subject: Advantages Of Cooling Concrete With Flake Ice [print this page] Concrete Cooling with Ice Concrete Cooling with Ice
Concrete cooling employing ice helps to prevent thermal cracking and longevity problems associated with pouring concrete when it's hot out in the open. Applying ice to replace half of the mixing water can only achieve a drop in temperature of 6 to 11 degrees Celsius. Flake ice can attain higher degrees of cooling given that it's incredibly close in chemical composition to dry ice. It also has the advantage of fluidity and much less clumping compared to standard ice.
The lowering of curing temperature also decreases the amount of time it takes for the concrete to set. Compression strength is also vastly improved from cooling down the slump while pouring. These facts become increasingly important in proportion to the size of concrete application. One can just imagine how much longer a job would take without these decreases in setting time and susceptibility to cracking. That same job might take two or three times as long as it could have taken if the concrete was cooled.
Classic techniques for concrete cooling using ice rely on applying chilled water and ice for mixing. Keeping the ice and water chilled in hot temperatures rapidly becomes a chore. Flake ice is far simpler to store and transport than regular ice. It stays cooler longer and with much less maintenance than ice and water. This means trucks can have superior flexibility inside the quantity of time taken to drive to the jobsites because the concrete won't go "hard" as fast.
Flake ice is also better for cooler climates too since it has better consistency in cooler weather where traditional ice and water mixtures might freeze and change consistency. Flake ice retains the advantages in slumps similar to hot concrete, but it does not suffer from the durability problems that arise from hot concrete.
Thermal cracking durability problems are particularly problematic in concrete pouring of a larger scale. Concrete cooling using ice or flake ice helps to alleviate these problems. Susceptibility to cracking is dramatically increased once curing temperatures exceed 70 degrees Celsius.
Ice, or flake ice, reduces the curing temperature of the concrete which reduces its susceptibility to cracking. In mass concrete applications, this is of even greater concern on account of the sheer size on the project. In the event you had to re-pour numerous areas later on because of cracking, one may possibly put additional consideration into cooling the concrete while it is setting.
