On the potential use of basalt waste as mineral fillers

Abstract

Abstract Producing present-day constructional materials on mineral binders is directly connected to the use of micro- and ultra-disperse technogenic modifying agents. They allow to obtain the maximum particle-particle packing in composition, provide rational raw mix design, contribute to structure formation process. The present article is devoted to the investigation of searching the most rational solution for the problem of basalt waste utilization, with the basalt waste being the valuable secondary raw material resource. The studies have shown that it is possible to use basalt dust as admix to gypsum composites. The basalt waste, by changing the composition grain-size distribution, provides the better particle-particle packing both for finegrained and coarse waste fractions, thus having positive effect on modified gypsum rock structure. Optimization of internal structure also contributes to the increase of gypsum rock strength properties. The obtained gypsum composite can be profitably employed for manufacturing small-piece walling gypsum materials by casting process.