5 Types of Cement Used in Construction

There are many different types of cement along with different types of cement grades that are used when it comes to concrete construction. These different types of cement have different properties, uses, and benefits as well as disadvantages. Are you ready to build? Get familiar with the 5 types of cement and how they’re used to ensure you make the right choice for your construction project.

Ordinary Portland Cement

The most commonly used cement type is ordinary Portland cement, which is a cement that works great for all general concrete construction.

In fact, Ordinary Portland is the most produced and used cement type in the world.

Portland Pozzolana Cement

This cement classification is achieved by grinding pozzolanic clinker with Portland cement. It can also be produced by adding calcium sulfate or gypsum to pozzolana. This cement type is highly resistant to chemicals compared to ordinary Portland.

It is a common cement type used in sewage construction, marine infrastructure, and whenever concrete needs to be submerged in water. This would include piers, bridges, and dams.

Rapid Hardening Cement

This type of cement is preferred when looking to achieve high strength early on. Rapid hardening concrete is generally used when formworks need to be removed at an early stage of the project. This specific cement blend possesses a higher c3s content and lime content, and is a finer grind. This allows it to attain a higher strength at an earlier stage.

For instance, the strength achieved at day three for rapid hardening isn’t attained until day seven if using ordinary Portland. This can actually speed up the overall construction process and save money on formwork. Rapid-hardening cement is also an extremely popular option when it comes to road work, and prefab concrete construction.

Quick Setting Cement

This type of cement differs from rapid-hardening cement in the sense that quick-setting cement does exactly what its name states – it sets quickly, and earlier than rapid-hardening cement. However, with that in mind, the overall rate of gain of strength is more like that of ordinary Portland cement.

That said, formworks can be removed earlier when dealing with both quick setting and rapid hardening cement blends. Quick-setting cement is a cement mix that is often used when concreting around water.

Low Heat Cement

In order to create low-heat cement, one must keep the tricalcium aluminate percentage below six, and this can be done by increasing the amount of c2s that is used. Using just a small amount of tricalcium aluminate, you can create the concrete to achieve low heat of hydration. Oftentimes, low-heat cement is used during projects that require mass concrete construction.

This would include gravity dams – low-heat cement would prevent concrete cracking because of heat. This is accomplished because the cement actually has a greater resistance to sulfates, is less reactive, and the initial setting time is better than OPC (ordinary Portland cement).

Contact Us

For more information on the cement types used during construction processes, call the experts at Trihill Ltd. Trihill is the leading construction company in the GTA and specializes in professional concrete forming for both commercial and residential properties. Give our team a call for your next construction project!