Laboratory Investigation of Polyethylene Glycol as a Concrete Shrinkage Reducing Admixture (SRA)

The use of shrinkage reducing admixtures, is one of the methods for reducing concrete drying shrinkage. As many of commercial shrinkage reducing admixtures are glycol-based, in this study the performance of polyethylene glycol as a shrinkage reducing admixture was studied. In the first phase the basic properties of the material were determined and its effect on workability, compressive strength development and free shrinkage of cement mortars containing various dosages of this material, from 1.5 to 3 % by cement weight, was investigated. In the second phase of this research, the effect of polyethylene glycol on various properties of concrete including; workability, compressive and tensile strength development, free shrinkage and cracking potential in restrained ring test was studied. The results showed that using polyethylene glycol at a dosage of 2, 3% by cement weight results in considerable reduction in free shrinkage and also the cracking potential under restrained conditions. However the effect is lower than that reported for the commercial materials.