Ready Mix
Concrete
What is Ready Mixed Concrete?
 Ready Mixed Concrete (RMC) is the
concrete delivered at site or into a purchaser's vehicle,
in a plastic condition and requiring no further treatment
before being placed in the position in which it is to
set and harden.
RMC was introduced in the early 1930s in the United
Kingdom and has since been in usage in the west. In
developed countries its usage has been over 70%. In
India, the concept was introduced only in the early
1990s. And usage is around 5-6% of the total concrete
requirement in the country.
As Dr Visvesvarayya was quoted saying, in the
journal 'The Master Builder' (Volume 1, No. 4,
July-August '99): "The Indian construction system
has to get into the practice of using the maximum out
of the performance that the concrete mix can give. While
they start using the maximum advantage, then they will
find RMC the best."
Advantages of RMC
- Structure constructed with RMC is likely to function
in a more predictable manner because of known concrete
strengths and uniformity of concrete maintained.
- Assured quality of raw material.
- Assured and uniform quality of required grade of concrete,
even on repetition.
- Better finishing due to pumpable mix.
- Control on Water-Cement ratio is maintained.
- Due to the highly workable and cohesive mix, less
chance of segregation/lumping and consequent absence
of honeycombs in the concrete.
- Lower labour and supervisory efforts.
- Better supervision of Concrete from the RMC supplier
at the construction site.
- Environment friendly.
- Multi-transportation of raw materials, for concrete,
eliminated.
- Quicker construction through continuous mechanized
operations.
- Eliminates need for ordering and storing Cement, Sand
and other aggregates at the site.
- Eliminates space constraint problems for storage.
- Timing for setting of concrete can be decided to suit
site or weather requirement.
- Wastage reduced due to bulk handling.
| Suppliers
of RMC in Chennai |
|
Coromandel Cements
|
|
L & T
|
|
Ramco
|
| Suppliers
of RMC Equipment |
|
Schwing Stetter
|
|
Siemens
|
|
Ocmer Truck Mixers
|
|
Lieberr
|
|
Hyundai
|
|
Gujarat Apollo
|
|
Ajax Fiori Engineering (ORU)
|
| |
| Varieties
of RMC |
|
Coloured Concrete
|
|
Condensed Silica Fume Concentrate
|
|
Enhanced Concrete
|
|
Fibre reinforced Concrete
|
|
Temperature controlled Concrete
|
| |
| Future of
RMC in India |
|
Projected that the 5% usage will reach 45% by
2020.
|
|
Insistence on the use of RMC by all major Construction
companies
|
|
Present forward integration will turn into more
individual business units.
|
Disadvantages of RMC
- More expensive than
Site Mixed Concrete (SMC).
SMC is at least 20% cheaper.
- RMC attracts Sales Tax, as a product.
- Congestion and traffic snarls could play spoilsport.
| Problems faced
by the Industry |
|
Lower level of awareness of the benefits of RMC
|
|
Acceptance of the concept
|
|
High Sales Tax
|
|
Variable Cement prices
|
|
Traffic restrictions on Transit Mixers
|
|
Shortage of trained manpower
|
| RMC - What
they say ... |
|
" As far as the superiority of technology
is concerned, no doubt , it (RMC) is one of the
best technologies, that should be adopted in all
construcion activities " - Professor B
Bhaskara Rao of Centre for Symbiosis of
Technology Environment and Management.
|
|
"It (RMC) is an ideal solution to many of
the problems we face. What is lacking is awareness.
We have to educate our engineers in the government
departments. " - Kantharaju of Karnataka
State Building Centre.
|
Author : Hemantha
Kumar Pamarthy
Picture : V Ganesan |
|
5:18:04 PM 
