Lea's Chemistry of Cement and Concrete (eBook)

Author Biographies

Peter C. Hewlett (Editor) is Director of the British Board of Agrément. He is President of the European Organisation for Technical Approvals (EOTA) and Past President of the European Union of Agrément (UEAtc). Before joining the BBA in March 1988, he was a Director of Cementation Research Limited, part of the then Trafalgar House group, working in construction and building research and development for almost 25 years. Professor Hewlett is a chartered chemist holding the degrees of BSc and PhD. In addition he was awarded a Doctor of Laws Honorary Degree (honoris causa) for his research into various materials aspects of concrete and in particular chemical modification and durability. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Institute of Materials and the UK Concrete Society, of which he is President Designate, as well as an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Concrete Technology. He holds a Visiting Industrial Professorship in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Dundee, Scotland, and has done so since 1986, working within the Concrete Technology Unit. He is currently Chairman of the Editorial Board of the Magazine of Concrete Research (published on behalf of the Institution of Civil Engineers) and has published and lectured widely around the world.

John Bensted read Chemistry for his BSc and PhD degrees at the University of London, before joining Blue Circle Cement at its research division in Greenhithe, Kent. Here he spent over 17 years in research, development, quality control and technical troubleshooting worldwide for the group’s entire range of cement types. He rose to become a principal scientist, and was awarded the DSc degree of the University of London for his cement research work. In 1985 he joined British Petroleum at their Sunbury Research Centre, initially as a senior drilling engineer before becoming a research associate. He directed research programmes on oilwell cement and functioned as an internal consultant for all aspects of cement technology for the different BP businesses worldwide. Since 1992 John has become more involved with academic research in cement and concrete technology as a visiting professor at the Universities of Keele, Greenwich and London (Birkbeck College). He acts as a consultant in cement technology, operating internationally.

Robert G. Blezard spent 36 years in the cement industry as a materials technologist and developed a deep interest in the history of the cement industry. In 1950 he was appointed Chief Analyst at the West Thurrock plant of Tunnel Cement Company, and in 1967 he became a section head in its newly formed Research and Development Department. Later in his career he moved to Blue Circle Cement where he specialised in the microscopy of cement materials. His work has appeared in many publications including Chemistry and Industry, Analyst and Cement and Concrete Research. He is a member of the American Concrete Institute’s Committee on the History of Concrete.

Bev Brown is a Chartered Physicist who qualified with a Special Physics degree at the University of London in the early 1960s. He is now the Divisional Technical Executive of Readymix (UK) Limited and is responsible for technical services within the company, covering sand, gravel, mortar and ready mixed concrete activities. Bev is Chairman of the BSI Sub-Committee dealing with aggregates for concrete. Also active in Europe, he has represented the UK as lead delegate on the CEN Committee which is developing the European Standard for concrete aggregates. At the same time he has been Convenor of the task group considering geometrical requirements for all the end uses of aggregates. Bev has contributed to a number of conferences concerned with aggregates, concrete and quality assurance, and presented a range of papers on these topics. His published work includes the contribution on ‘Marine Aggregates’ in the book Standards for Aggregates. Well known in the industry, he also participates in various technical committees within the Concrete Society, Construction Industry Research and Information Association, European Ready Mixed Concrete Organisation, Quarry Products Association and the Quality Scheme for Ready Mixed Concrete.

Alain Capmas studied Physics at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale of Lausanne, Switzerland. After two years doing computational research in Compagnie Générale d’Electricité, he joined Lafarge in 1975 where he worked on refractory castables and Portland cement before progressing to run a factory producing calcium aluminate cement. In 1987 he transferred to the Central Research Laboratory where he led a research effort to understand the factors affecting the quality of calcium aluminate cements. During this time he developed a thermodynamic approach to understanding the hydration of calcium aluminate cements with the team of Professor Pierre Baret of the University of Dijon. He was then Director of Research and Development at Lafarge Fondu International (now Lafarge Aluminates) until 1995 when he became Research and Development Director of the Central Research Laboratory of Lafarge.

Rodney M. Edmeades graduated in Chemistry in 1953 and, following an intensive technical training course, worked in the cement industry (Blue Circle Group) for 11 years. Joining Cementation Research in 1964, he was appointed a Director in 1977 in charge of the Materials Technology Section. His work at the time encompassed the investigation of cement hydration mechanisms and the interaction of admixtures, together with the development of materials used in civil engineering, concrete repair, ground engineering and mining. He co-authored a number of papers and was elected a Member of the Institute of Concrete Technology in 1988. In that year as a result of a company reorganisation he became an Associate Director of Trafalgar House Technology, responsible for Construction Materials, and acted as Senior Consultant to various group units prior to retirement in May 1995.

Margi Eglinton is a graduate in science of the University of Adelaide, South Australia. Although now retired, she was for more than 40 years a practical chemist. The later, and major part of her working life was spent as Chief Chemist to Wimpey Laboratories Limited. She developed a strong interest in the causes of damage to concrete, and an area of special interest to her has been microbiological causes of damage, particularly sulfate-reducing and sulfate-oxidising bacteria. She has served on several committees and working parties engaged in drawing up recommendations for the performance of concrete in difficult ground conditions, analytical test methods for the determination of harmful contaminants and the foundation of research programmes to investigate the behaviour of concrete in aggressive conditions. She has written several papers and a book on the subject.

Per Fidjestel graduated from Norwegian Technical University in 1973 with a degree in Civil Engineering. He joined Det Norske Veritas working in the area of offshore and marine structures, including cold climate technology. His main role, however, concerned concrete technology. In 1986 he joined Elkem Materials and has since been engaged in a variety of capacities, mainly related to R&D, marketing and technical support in the area of microsilica for concrete. Per is a fellow of ACI and a member of several technical and board-appointed committees, including Chairman of the International Activities Committee. He has published about 50 technical papers mainly on corrosion and/or microsilica. He has also been a member of CEN groups related to microsilica, and is a member of ASTM C-9 on Concrete and D-18 on Geotechnics.

Fredrik P. Glasser is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. He is the author or co-author of more than 350 papers on material science, including many on cement. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and has received numerous distinctions, including Scientific Chairmanship of the 10th International Congress on the Chemistry of Cements and the Copeland Award of the American Ceramic Society. His current research includes the development of new and improved cementitious materials, with emphasis on low-energy clinkering. He leads a Commission of the European Programme which has as its objective establishing a scientific basis for the cement conditioning of nuclear wastes.

Peter J. Jackson entered the cement industry in 1952 at the Research Department of the Associated Portland Cement Manufacturers Limited after graduating in chemistry at the University and worked on the development and subsequent production of a range of special cements. After the award of an USC in 1962 he transferred into cement manufacture, and having attained Chartered status as Control Engineer was responsible for quality and process control at the eight works located in the Midlands. In 1972 he was appointed Chief Chemist of the Aberthaw and Bristol Channel Portland Cement Company Limited and in 1982 he became the Chief Chemist of the Rugby Portland Cement Company Limited. From 1989 he worked as an independent consultant dealing with matters associated with cement and its manufacture, while maintaining his membership of the European (CEN) Technical Committee on cement and the Convenorship of its Working Group on masonry cement.

Eric E. Lachowski is an electron microscopist in the Department of Chemistry, University of Aberdeen. He has...