A comparative evaluation of sepiolite and nano-montmorillonite on the rheology of cementitious materials for 3D printing

Through the last decade, methods of digital manufacturing of concrete gained a significant interest compared to conventional concrete. The main challenge in additive manufacturing (3D printing) is to design a highly thixotropic cementitious system. This study aims to investigate the use of sepiolite as a rheology modifier as a novel approach to improve the thixotropic behavior and adapt cementitious systems to 3D printing. To under-stand the influence of sepiolite on rheological properties, a comparative evaluation with nano-montmorillonite was established. The effectiveness of clay addition was also investigated in fly-ash amended cement-based ma-terials. The rheological analysis was done on cement-paste samples containing both clays in terms of their effects on thixotropy, structural build-up, and recovery. A preliminary printability assessment was done with a lab scale printer having a ram extruder. The results show that the incorporation of clays increased the dynamic yield stress and time-dependent evolution of static yield stress. Moreover, the addition of clays improved the thixotropic behavior of cement-based systems, particularly those containing fly-ash. Herein, the sepiolite was found to be more effective compared to nano-montmorillonite in terms of improving thixotropy, structural build-up and recovery. The results showed that use of fly-ash enhances the printability of the mix for the specified extruder and the samples containing 1% nano-montmorillonite or 0.5% sepiolite can be printed. The positive effects of sepiolite were attributed to opposing surface charges of the clay layers and its micro-fibrous microstructure. The findings in this study enabled an in-depth understanding of the rheology and printability of fly-ash amended clay containing printable cement-based mortars.