Shotcrete (Civil Engineering Technology)

Hi friends .. How are you today? Did you know about shotcrete? Surely some people already know, especially those who work in the construction world. This time I will share some knowledge about shotcrete.

Indonesia is one country with a very diverse landscape. One of them is the existence of cliffs and rock slopes located in various parts of Indonesia. The existence of the cliff structure and the slopes of these rocks is the aversion of landslides or collapse.

As the landslide handling can be done with various methods, yaitudengan Shotcrete, Rock Mass Bonding, Rock Bolting, Drainage, Dowels, Tied-BackWalls, Resloping, PUR Injection, Soil Nailing, Wiremesh, Rock Sheds, Buttresses, Shot-in-place Buttress, Retaining Walls, Scaling, Triming, and so forth. One of the most commonly used methods is "Shotcrete".

Shotcrete is the method of handling the sliding with the principle of applying the concrete on a particular field, in this case the cliff slope, with the spray system (spraying) using a mechanical device (shotcrete machine). The concrete is sprayed with pressure from the compressor through the hose.

Shotcrete was first discovered by Carl Ethan Akeley (1864-1926) in 1910. This American architect was inspired to realize the real reproduction of dinosaurs for a tourist park. Given the size of the structure, it has the idea of ​​developing a "cement gun" machine that allows spraying of cement mortar, it is called Shotcrete. In the same year, Kaspar Winkler founded Sika. Since then Sika has contributed greatly to the development of Shotcrete technology, both the chemistry of the shotcrete material itself (Sigunit) and its equipment known as Alliva Machine.

Shotcrete is widely applied because it is suitable for use in various rock types except sand, easy to operate because it only takes 1 person operator, can crush very quickly. In some shotcrete experiments with the use of additional mixtures, shotcrete can harden within 1 hour.The strength level also exceeds the concrete mix known by the layman. Within 1-6 hours, a wall that was shotcrete sprayed was able to withstand collisions from similar heavy equipment wheel loaders, and only scratched slightly on the surface, and was able to withstand blasting vibrations that have tap from tens to hundreds of thousands of psi per second.

Advantages:

• It has a strong adhesive power, so it can be concretized on the sloped, irregular, and hanging plane.
• Not using mold.
• Variations of concrete thickness can be arranged easily.
• Saving time.

Deficiency

• High initial investment cost.
• The amount of waste material left out.
• Dangerous to operator health (generated dust), so special health equipment is required.
• Factors of failure in the field is so great that it takes an experienced special tool operators.

So little science about shotcreet that I have written. Hopefully make learning for writers and readers. If you want to see shotcrete directly, you can meet on the cross road between Takengon - Blangkejeren. thanks.

References:
Wikipedia
BelajarSipil.com