Potential to Design Magnesium Potassium Phosphate Cement Paste Based on an Optimal Magnesia-to-Phosphate Ratio

Abstract

Magnesium potassium phosphate cement (MKPC) is an important engineering material, and it has been attracting increasing attention. Properties of MKPC based materials depend largely on the magnesia-to-phosphate molar ratio (M/P) and the water-to-cement mass ratio (W/C). While the effect of W/C has been clear, experimental results of the effect of M/P in the literature seem to be inconsistent. In this paper, a model is developed to unify these experimental findings. The model hypothesizes that the strength of MKPC based materials is dominated by the volume ratio of magnesium potassium phosphate hexahydrate and space (MKP/space ratio), and the ultimate MKP/space ratio can be limited by the availabilities of the three reactants, i.e. magnesia, phosphate and water. It proves that, if the W/C of MKPC-based material is kept constant, there exists an optimal M/P that results in the highest compressive strength. It appears that the higher the W/C is, the smaller this optimal M/P will be.

Department(s)

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering

Keywords and Phrases

Cements; Compressive Strength; Magnesia; Magnesium; Microstructure; Phosphates; Potassium; Chemically Bonded Ceramics; Engineering Materials; Magnesium Potassium Phosphate Cements; Magnesium Potassium Phosphate Hexahydrates; Mass Ratio; MKP/Space Ratio; Molar Ratio; Volume Ratio; Strength of Materials

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

0264-1275

Document Type

Article - Journal

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd, All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Mar 2017

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