Indirect Determination of Split Strength and Abrasion Resistance of Concrete Paving Blocks as a Function of Dry Bulk Specific Gravity and Ultrasonic Pulse Velocity

Artificial paving blocks made with portland cement concrete are widespread in many countries. These paving blocks come in various designs such as Interlocking and Italian Flower, and they are produced in special machinery out of rather high quality concrete having about 50 MPa compressive strength. The reason for the concrete blocks being used instead of the natural cobble stones is basically economical. The laboratory equipment necessary to measure the split strength and abrasion resistance of the paving blocks, which are two of the major properties to be determined for quality check, are costly and the tests require a considerable amount of time and man power. Herein, a detailed experimental study is performed to relate both the split strength and the abrasion resistance of concrete paving blocks to “dry bulk specific gravity” (DBSG) of and “ultrasonic pulse velocity” (UPV) through any blocks. In conclusion, statistically significant regression based models are obtained using randomly taken samples from seven different manufacturers, relating the split strength to DBSG, and the abrasion resistance to UPV.