Suitability of Laterite Fines as a Partial Replacement for Sand in the Production of Sandcrete Bricks
The provision of affordable housing units from indigenous building materials has been the focus of most researchers in recent times. This paper focuses on the utilisation of laterite fines as replacement for sand in the production of sandcrete bricks as masonry units. With a mix ratio and a water/cement ratio of 1:6 and 0.50 respectively, batches with 0% (control specimens), 10%, 20%, 30%, 40% and 50% laterite fines replacing the sand were adopted in this study. In all, 96 bricks were cast, tested and compared with those of conventional sandcrete bricks (control specimens). Tests studied were density, compressive strengths (wet and dry) and water absorption. Data results revealed that the laterite fines used could satisfactorily replace the sand up to 30% for the production of structural masonry units even though bricks need to be protected when used in waterlogged areas or below ground level.
EVALUATION OF LATERIZED EARTH MOISTCONCRETE IN CONSTRUCTION WORKS
This paper evaluates the satisfaction of the minimum compressive strength 
requirement of laterized earth moist concrete for grade C20 of BS 8110 (1997) for use 
in reinforced concrete works, which is 20 N/mm2. Compressive strength test and 
water absorption tests were conducted with laterite partially replacing fine 
aggregate. Batching was by weight, mix ratio of 1:2:4 (cement: laterite/sand: granite) 
was used with a water/cement ratio of 0.3. sized concrete cubes were cast 
and cured for 56 days, then weighed and crushed. The result shows that the 
compressive strength of the earth moist concrete (EMC) at 0%, 10% and 20% laterite 
replacement for 28days respectively are , and . 
The compressive strength of the EMC 0%, 10% and 20% laterite replacement for 56 
days respectively are , and . These indicate 
that increase in the compressive strength of all the EMC specimen is directly 
proportional to the increase in curing age but increase in the laterite replacement 
reduces the strength.
Numerical Simulation of Induction Heating Process of Continuous Casting Slab
Compared with traditional blazing furnace, the Continuous Casting-Direct Rolling is an advanced manufacturing steel technology, which can reduce energy waste, decrease pollution and enhance efficiency. The characteristics of steels during induction heating are complex, the change of material properties with temperature makes exact analysis methods very difficult to implement. Therefore, a powerful computer aided numerical tool (i.e., finite difference analysis) is selected to numerically model the induction heating process in this paper. The mathematic model coupling with electromagnetic field and thermal field was established, and it was solved by finite difference method (FDM), thus the slab temperature distribution and its variation with time were obtained, and the characteristics in whole induction heating process were studied. To validate the program feasible, the results were evaluated and compared with experiment results, which showed that the simulation results are reliable and effective. The skin effect in heating process from the two results was studied and demonstrated, the temperature change caused by different parameters such as the induced power intensity and the corner radian were also presented, which indicate that the slab temperature can be heated uniformly through adjusting these parameters, thus the continuous casting slab can meet the rolling requirement.