The very early age flocculation of a cement based paste, in which cement is partially substituted by a calcined clay, metakaolin, is studied. We use rheological and ultrasonic reflection to monitor the evolution of the elastic properties of the paste with time, and light scattering to follow the change of its relaxation modes at small scales. We show that, at very early ages, of the order of hundreds of seconds after the paste preparation, a network of flocculated particles establishes, which manifests by a slow down of the dynamics of the relaxation modes of the paste at small scale. Then, this network consolidates and the macroscopic elastic modulus of the paste progressively increases with time, leading eventually to the setting of the paste. These observations show that, whatever the degree of replacement of clinker by metakaolin, a connected network establishes at very early times after the paste preparation, although the kinetics of flocculation slows down with clinker replacement.

中文翻译：

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水泥基浆料中有吸引力的颗粒网络的构建和巩固


研究了水泥基浆体的早期絮凝，其中水泥被煅烧粘土、偏高岭土部分替代。我们使用流变学和超声波反射来监测糊剂的弹性特性随时间的演变，并使用光散射来跟踪其弛豫模式在小尺度上的变化。我们表明，在很早的时候，在糊剂制备后数百秒的数量级，絮凝颗粒的网络就建立起来，这表现为小规模糊剂弛豫模式动力学的减慢。然后，该网络固化，并且糊剂的宏观弹性模量随着时间逐渐增加，最终导致糊剂凝固。这些观察结果表明，无论偏高岭土对熟料的替代程度如何，尽管絮凝动力学随着熟料替代而减慢，但在糊料制备后的很早时期就建立了连接的网络。