Nanomechanichal properties of synthetic calcium silicate hydrate

Abstract Calcium silicate hydrate (C-S-H), the main product from portland cement hydration, has a great influence on most physical and mechanical properties of cement based materials. However, until now, there are no structural models relating chemical composition, micro and nanostructure with its physical-chemical and mechanical properties. In this study, we used the technique of instrumented indentation to evaluate the nanomechanical properties of two synthetic C-S-H with different Ca/Si ratio. The results showed that it is possible to estimate with a good accuracy the elastic modulus and hardness using only 16 indented points, with several cycles of loading for each indentation, and that the intensity of the indentation load is not significant. It was also shown that the C-S-H elastic modulus increases when the Ca/Si ratio decreases, confirming the calculations based on field forces methods of Manzano et al. (2009). However it was found that micro and nanoporosity have a significant effect on the result. Finally, a discussion about some of the parameters to be controlled to modify the mechanical characteristics of the C-S-H gel produced by the portland cement hydration is presented.