Investigation on the use of crushed waste of ceramic tiles and clay brick as aggregate in dune sand based mortars

Abstract This present study aims to examine the possibility of using the dune sand which is abundant in Algeria in the manufacture of mortars having sufficient physical and mechanical performances to exploit them in different applications in the field of construction of buildings. The improvement of the mortars based on dune sand was made through the addition of crushed wastes of ceramic tiles and red clay brick. The formulation of mixtures is based on the substitution of dune sand with crushed wastes at different weight contents; 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25%. The W/C ratio is fixed at 0.7. The results obtained show that the incorporation of these additions improves the compactness, the mechanical strengths and the sulphate resistance, and enhancement the dynamic modulus of elasticity with 15% ratio of waste incorporation. Further to this, it was also observed that the inclusion of the used wastes with determined percentages can provide physical and mechanical performances exceed that given by the mortar made with alluvial sand, which demonstrate their effectiveness to the improvement of the various properties of the mortar.