The Comparative Assessment of Curing Methods and Their Effect on the Strength Characteristics of Concrete

Abstract

This study comparatively evaluates the influence of water-submerged, polythene and air curing on selected strength characteristics of concrete. A nominal mix ratio of 1:2:4 with a water-cement ratio of 0.50 was adopted. A total of 36 concrete cubes and 36 beam specimens were produced using 150 × 150 × 150 mm cube moulds and 75 × 300 × 150 mm beam moulds, respectively. The specimens were cured under the three selected regimes and tested at 7, 14, 21 and 28 days. The investigated properties were compressive strength, flexural strength and density, while slump was used to assess the workability of the fresh concrete. The average slump was 63 mm, indicating a medium-workability mix. The experimental results show that water-submerged curing produced the highest compressive strength at 28 days (29.67 N/mm²), followed by polythene curing (20.74 N/mm²) and air curing (18.96 N/mm²). Water-submerged curing also produced the highest 28-day flexural strength (3.25 N/mm²). The results demonstrate that maintaining adequate moisture during the early stages of hydration is critical to strength development. The findings are consistent with previous experimental evidence showing that water curing generally provides superior strength development, while sealing methods such as polythene can perform better than unprotected air curing when they effectively reduce moisture loss (Safiuddin et al., 2007; Raheem et al., 2013). Overall, water-submerged curing was the most effective of the three methods investigated under the conditions of this study.