Abstract
Desorptivity (R), which defines the water retaining ability of mortars in the freshly-mixed state, has been determined for hydrated lime (CL90) mortars using a modified American petroleum institute pressure cell. CL90 mortar (i.e. non-hydraulic pure lime mortar) is dramatically more water retaining than any of the hydraulic mortars. This paper demonstrates that influencing the strong water retaining characteristics of CL90 mortars is possible and suggests underlying causes of behaviour. The results show that hydrated lime mortars can become less water retaining by the use of simple ionic solutions as mix water over a range of capillary pressures typically exerted by absorbent masonry substrates such as brick. The effect of temperature is also reported. This ability to control desorptivity could lead to mortar/substrate optimization or ‘matching’ to overcome the inherent problems of either very high or very low suction substrate materials.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
API (1998) API Specification 10. American Petroleum Institute, Washington
Bolton MD, Mckinley JD (1997) Geotechnical properties of fresh cement grout—pressure filtration and consolidation tests. Géotechnique 47:347–352
British Standards Institution (2001) Building lime—part 1: definitions, specifications and conformity criteria. BSI, London, p 459
Carter MA, Green KM, Wilson MA, Hoff WD (2003) Measurement of the water retentivity of cement mortars. Advances in Cement Research 15:155–159
Collier NC, Wilson MA, Carter MA, Hoff WD, Hall C, Ball RJ, El-Turki A, Allen GC (2007) Theoretical development and validation of a sharp front model of the dewatering of a slurry by an absorbent substrate. J Phys D 40:4049–4054
El-Turki RJ, Ball MA, Carter MA, Wilson C, Ince GC (2010) Allen “effect of dewatering on the strength of lime and cement mortars”. J Am Ceram Soc 93(7):2074–2081
Green KM, Carter MA, Hoff WD, Wilson MA (1999) The effect of lime and admixtures on the water-retaining properties of cement mortars. Cem Concr Res 29:1743–1747
Hall C, Hoff WD (2002) Water transport in brick, stone and concrete. Taylor and Francis, London
CRC (1998) Handbook of chemistry and physics 1997–1998. CRC Press, Boca Raton
Ince C, Carter M, Wilson M, Collier N, El-Turki A, Ball R, Allen G (2011) Factors affecting the water retaining characteristics of lime and cement mortars in the freshly-mixed state. Mater Struct 44(2):509–516
Ince C, Carter M, Wilson M, El-Turki A, Ball R, Allen G, Collier N (2010) Analysis of the abstraction of water from freshly mixed jointing mortars in masonry construction. Mater Struct 43(7):985–992
Lothenbach B, Winnefeld F, Alder C, Wieland E, Lunk P (2007) Effect of temperature on the pore solution, microstructure and hydration products of Portland cement pastes. Cem Concr Res 37:483–491
McKinley JD, Bolton MD (1999) Technical papers—a geotechnical description of fresh cement grout—filtration and consolidation behaviour. Mag Concr Res 30:295–307
Meeten GH, Sherwood JD (1994) The hydraulic permeability of bentonite suspensions with granular inclusions. Chem Eng Sci 49:3249–3256
Sherwood JD, Meeten GH (1997) The filtration properties of compressible mud filtercakes. J Petrol Sci Eng 18:73–81
Smiles DE (1970) A theory of constant pressure filtration. Chem Eng Sci 25:985–996
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Ince, C., Carter, M.A. & Wilson, M.A. The water retaining characteristics of lime mortar. Mater Struct 48, 1177–1185 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1617/s11527-013-0224-0
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1617/s11527-013-0224-0