Ready mix concrete is made by mixing cement, water and other aggregates. It is the best choice if you need high-quality concrete products. Domestically, it can be used for driveways, patios, fencing, foundation and even floor surfacing. Commercially for high-rise buildings, bridges, car parking and infrastructure.
Ready-mixed concrete in Essex typically ranges from £130 to £185 per cubic metre. It eliminates the need for using on-site mixing, and thus saves time and labour costs. In this guide, you’ll know about its types and benefits so that you can choose the best among them in accordance with your needs. So, lets begin.
5 Types of Ready-Mix Concrete
The following are the five types of ready-mix concrete and their uses you must know:
Standard Ready-Mix Concrete
Standard ready-mix concrete is commonly used for slabs, driveways and columns, etc. It is prepared in a specific ratio of water, cement, and other admixtures. Standard ready-mix concrete is suitable for both commercial and housing purposes. It is usually delivered fresh and should not be kept for an extended period of time.
High Strength Concrete
High-strength concrete is tight and dense, highly used for commercial and industrial purposes. Ingredients like silica fume, fly ash, or slag are added to improve its density and strength. High-strength concrete is the best choice to be used in high-rise buildings, bridges and heavy industrial construction to support the massive load.
Self-Compacting Concrete
Self-compacting concrete has a high degree of fluidity; it flows easily into any shape and design due to fine aggregates and a water-reducing agent. Despite its smooth texture, it is still adhesive and used in building and bridges because it helps in maintaining stability. You can contact a concrete supplier in Surrey to get a high-quality one.
Shrink Mixed Concrete
Shrink-mixed concrete is a type of mixture where the concrete is partially mixed at the batching plant and then mixing is completed in the transit mixer truck during transportation to the job site. It is mainly used for large-scale infrastructure and also for remote construction sites, including highways, road sides and flyovers, etc.
Transit Mixed Concrete
Transit mixed concrete is a type of ready-mixed concrete in which the concrete materials are directly loaded into the drum. It helps in the prevention of hardening for both residential and commercial projects. Moreover, mainly used in large-scale buildings, and even for driveways and patios in homes, etc.
Advantages of Using Ready Mix Concrete
Here are some of the benefits of using ready-mix concrete in construction projects:
Quality
The concrete that is mixed manually doesn’t offer high-end and guaranteed results. But ready-mix concrete never loses its consistency. Therefore, it is considered best for commercial and residential projects due to its matchless quality. You don’t have to care about various environmental factors, such as temperature, which saves you from inconsistencies which may arise from on-site mixing.
Efficiency
The traditional concrete comes up with a lot of labour work, such as delivery, storage and mixing. But the ready-mix concrete is efficient as compared to others because it is directly delivered to the site and is ready for immediate use in construction projects.
Environment Friendly
Ready mix concrete has the ability to absorb and retain heat, thus being environmentally friendly. Most of its ingredients are readily available and easy to use, which means that their impact on the environment is low. It can also be recycled as its leftovers aggregate in new mixtures. Even for industrial work, it emits fly ash or slag instead of high emissions produced by traditional concrete mixtures.
Less Wastage
Ready-mix concrete is precisely measured in order to create a uniform product; there is no risk of getting a huge amount of leftovers. It is prepared in a way that is highly specific in accordance with the construction, hence there is no use of excess materials and no large amount of waste. It doesn’t even require bulk packaging in plastic, and as a result, it saves the site from unwanted debris.
Low Labour
Instead of workers mixing cement, sand or other aggregates. Ready-mix concrete is pre-mixed and is directly available on the construction site, so workers are free from lifting heavy bags and manual mixing of the products, thus enabling them to focus on the placement and finishing work that requires more focus and expertise of the workers.
Conclusion
The ready-mixed concrete gets exactly delivered at your desired location, and it also saves your cost and time, making your construction work more efficient. Its long life span cuts off the heavy construction expenses in the long run. It reduces the hazards of manual mixing and gives you the desired results for your construction because it is prepared according to the project requirements.