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UTILISATION OF WASTE PLASTIC IN MANUFACTURING OF BRICKS AND

PAVER BLOCKS

Article  in  International Journal of Applied Engineering Research · January 2016

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 International Journal of Applied Engineering Research, ISSN 0973-4562 Vol. 11 No.3 (2016)
© Research India Publications; http/www.ripublication.com/ijaer.htm
UTILISATION OF WASTE PLASTIC IN
MANUFACTURING OF BRICKS AND PAVER
BLOCKS
Dinesh.S 1 Dinesh.A 2
Assistant Professor, Assistant Professor,
Department of civil engineering, Department of civil engineering,
Sri Ramakrishna Institute of Sri Ramakrishna Institute of
technology, technology,
Coimbatore, India Coimbatore, India
Abstract- Plastic waste which is increasing day by day
becomes eyesore and in turn pollutes the environment, especially
in high mountain villages where no garbage collection system
exists. A large amount of plastic is being brought into the tourist
trekking regions are discarded or burned which leads to the
contamination of environment and air. Hence, these waste
plastics are to be effectively utilised. High-density polyethylene
(HDPE) and polyethylene (PE) bags are cleaned and added with
sand and aggregate at various percentages to obtain high
strength bricks that possess thermal and sound insulation
properties to control pollution and to reduce the overall cost of
construction, this is one of the best ways to avoid the
accumulation of plastic waste which is an on-degradable
pollutant. This alternatively saves the quanta of sand/clay that
has to be taken away from the precious river beds/mines. The
plastic waste is naturally available in surplus quantity and hence
the cost factor comes down. Also Colouring agents can be added
to the mixture to attain desired shades. Hence in this thesis, an
attempt is made to study regard the properties of the brick which
is manufactured using plastic wastes.
Keywords-Plastic waste, high density polyethylene, polyethylene,
properties, bricks, ferric oxide.
I. INTRODUCTION
The waste plastic will be large in household time. In
many countries the compositions of waste is different, that it
is affected by the socioeconomic characters, waste
management programs and consumption patterns, but
364
Kirubakaran.K 3
PG Student,
Department of civil engineering,
Sri Ramakrishna Institute of
technology,
Coimbatore, India
generally the level of plastic in the waste composition is
high.one of the largest component of plastic waste is
polyethylene which is followed by polypropylene.
Polyethylene terephthalate and Polystyrene. The
large volume of materials required for construction is
potentially a major area for the reuse of waste materials.
Recycling the plastics has advantages since it is widely
used and has a long service life, which means that the waste
is being removed from the waste stream for a long period.
Because the amount of clay required to make bricks is large,
the environmental benefits are not only related to the safe
disposal of bulk waste, but also to the reduction of
environmental impacts that arise due to burning of plastics.
Plastics also help to conserve energy at the home
Furthermore, the U.S. Department of Energy estimates that
use of plastic foam insulation in homes and buildings each
year will ultimately save close to 60 million barrels of oil
versus other kinds of insulation. The same principles
apply in appliances such as refrigerators and air
conditioners.
II. MATERIALS USED
A.Waste plastics
By definition the plastics can be made to different
shapes when they are heated.in closest environment it exists in
the different forms such as cups, furniture’s, basins, plastic
bags, food and drinking containers, and they are become
waste material. Accumulation of such wastes can result
into hazardous effects to both human and plant life.
Therefore, need for proper disposal, and, if possible, use of
these wastes in their recycled forms, occurs. This can be done
through process of plastic management. Waste management in
respect to plastic can be done by recycling. If they are not
recycled then they will become big pollutant to the
 International Journal of Applied Engineering Research, ISSN 0973-4562 Vol. 11 No.3 (2016)
© Research India Publications; http/www.ripublication.com/ijaer.htm

environment as they not decompose easily and also not allow TABLE II PROPERTIES OF RIVER SAND
the water to percolate in to the soil and they are also poisonous
. S.NO EXPERIMENTS RESULTS
TABLE I PROPERTIES OF PLASTICS POLYETHYLENE.
1 Natural Water Content (%) 10.7
S.NO EXPERIMENTS RESULTS 2 Specific Gravity 2.48
1 Density at 23oC .958 3 Unit Weight (g/cc) 1.59
2 Elasticity modulus 9 4 Fineness modulus 2.89
3 Tensile creep strength 8
4 Bending creep modulus 1 The properties of the River sand were obtained by
5 various tests conducted in our college laboratory including
Tensile strength at 23oC 2
Standard proctor test.
6 Elongation at break (%) >600
C. Red oxide (ferric oxide)
7 Thermal conductivity 0
Iron (III) oxide or ferric oxide is the inorganic
8 Ignition temperature 3 compound with the formula Fe2O3. It is one of the three
main oxides of iron, the other two being iron (II) oxide
This results were obtained from official website central (FeO), which is rare, and iron (II, III) oxide (Fe3O4), which
institute of plastic engineering and technology, Chennai, India also occurs naturally as the mineral magnetite. As the
mineral known as hematite, Fe2O3 is the main source of
iron for the steel industry. Fe2O3 is ferromagnetic, dark
red, and readily attacked by acids. Iron (III) oxide is often
called rust, and to some extent this label is useful, because
rust shares several properties and has a similar composition.
To a chemist, rust is considered an ill-defined material,
described as hydrated ferric oxide.
Iron(III) oxide which can be used as a pigment in
the name of “pigment brown 6”,"pigment brown
7","pigment red 101”. for example, pigment brown and the
Fig 1: Waste plastics
pigment red are used in food and drug administration and
also in cosmetics.
B. River sand0
Sand is naturally occurring granular material which is
composed of mineral particles and finely divided material.
The composition of sand varies depending on the local rock
conditions and sources, but the most constituent of sand in
inland continental settings and non-tropical coastal region is
silica dioxide (Sio2) in the form of quartz. The second
commonly used sand is the calcium carbonate, for example
aragonite, which has mostly been created, over the past half
billion years, by various forms of life, like coral and shellfish.
Sand are now used in all the construction process.
Fig 3: Red oxide

The properties of red oxide is to make colouring to

the paver blocks. They are red, odourless and their density is
5.26 g/cm3. their melting point is also at 2851 degrees
Fahrenheit.

III. CONTROL MIX DESIGN

. In order to find the plastic soil bricks that they
possess high compressive strength with various mix
Fig 2: river sand proportions are made and they are tested using compressive
testing machine. The mix proportion were in the ratio of (1:2,
1:3, 1:4, 1:5, 1:6)
These are the ratio which represent the plastic, river
sand respectively.

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 International Journal of Applied Engineering Research, ISSN 0973-4562 Vol. 11 No.3 (2016)
© Research India Publications; http/www.ripublication.com/ijaer.htm

In first step we should collect the waste plastic bags

and the polyethylene bags are sorted out and remaining are
disposed safely.
Next the collected waste bags are cleaned with
water and dried to remove the water present in it after this
the plastics are burned out by using stones and firewood.
The stones are arranged to hold the drum and the firewood
is placed in the gap between the stones and it is ignited. The
drum is placed over the above setup and it is heated to
remove the moisture present in it. Then the plastic bags Fig 5: Compressive strength for fly ash bricks
are added to the drum one by one and the river sand is
added to the plastic when it turns into hot liquid.
The sand is added is mixed thoroughly using rod
and trowel before it hardens. The mixture has a very short
setting hence mixing process must not consume more time
on the other hand the process should be complete. In case
of Paver blocks, Red oxide is added (less than 10%
of the total weight) to impart dark red colour.
These mixtures is then poured in to the brick
mould and they are compacted using steel rod and surface is
finished using trowel. Before placing the mixture into the Fig 6: Compressive strength for burnt bricks
mould, the sides of the mould are oiled to easy removal of
bricks.

IV. TESTING PROCEDURES

To know the quality of plastic sand bricks and

plastic sand paver blocks following tests can be performed.
In these tests some are performed in laboratory and the rest
are on field.

A. Compressive test Fig 7: Compressive strength for plastic sand paver blocks

This is done to know the compressive strength of the TABLE III Comparison of compressive strength of Plastic
bricks and paver blocks. This is also called crushing strength sand bricks possessing various ratios
of bricks and paver blocks. Generally five specimens of
bricks are taken to laboratory for testing and tested one MIX PLASTIC SAND COMPRESSIVE
by one. In this test a brick and paver block specimen is DESIGNATION RATIO STRENGTH(N/mm2)
put on crushing machine and applied pressure till it
breaks. The ultimate pressure at which brick is crushed M1 1:2 4.65
is taken into account. All five brick specimens are tested
one by one and average result is taken as brick's M2 1:3 4.78
compressive /crushing strength. The plastic sand bricks and
paver blocks of different ratios are tested one by one and in M3 1:4 5.12
this the high compression is found and comparison made
between the fly ash and normal bricks. M4 1:5 4.92

M5 1:6 3.17

TABLE 1V Comparison of compressive strength of

Plastic sand bricks with its counterpart

SI.NO TYPE OF BRICK COMPRESSIVE

STRENGTH(N/mm2)

Fig 4: Compressive strength for plastic sand bricks 1 Fly ash 4.19

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 International Journal of Applied Engineering Research, ISSN 0973-4562 Vol. 11 No.3 (2016)
© Research India Publications; http/www.ripublication.com/ijaer.htm

2 Burnt clay 3.15 TABLE VII water absorption for various types of paver
blocks
3 Plastic brick 5.12
SI.NO TYPES OF PAVER WATER
BLOCKS ABSORPTION
TABLE V Comparison of compressive strength of
Plastic sand and paver 1 Plastic sand 1.082

SI.NO TYPE OF COMPRESSIVE 2 Ordinary 3.709

PAVER BLOCK STRENGTH(N/mm2)

1 Plastic sand 8.19 C. Efflorescence test

2 Ordinary 7.17
B. Water absorption test
In this the bricks first weighted in dry condition and
they are immersed in water for 24 hours. After that they are
taken out from water and they are wipe out with cloth. Then
the difference between the dry and wet bricks percentage are
calculated.
The presence of alkalis in bricks is
harmful and they form a grey or white layer on brick
surface by absorbing moisture. To find out the presence of
alkalis in bricks this test is performed. In this test a brick is
immersed in fresh water for 24 hours and then it's taken
out from water and allowed to dry in shade. The plastic
sand brick has low alkali content and so a little white patch
is formed over the surface

Fig 10: Efflorescence test on plastic sand brick

Fig 8: Dry brick weight D. Fire resistance test

The Plastic is highly susceptible to fire but in case

of Plastic sand bricks/Paver blocks the presence of sand
imparts insulation. There is no change in the structural
properties of block of bricks up to 180 o C above which
visible cracks are seen and the blocks/bricks deteriorate with
increase in temperature.

E. Hardness test

In this test a scratch is made on brick surface with

Fig 9: Wet brick weight steel rod (any hard material can be used) which was difficult
to imply the bricks or blocks were hard. This shows the
TABLE VI Water absorption for various brick possess high quality.
type of bricks
V CONCLUSIONS
SI NO TYPE OF BRICK WATER
ABSORPTION The Plastic sand bricks possess more advantages
1 Fly ash 8.012 which include Cost efficiency, Removal of waste products
2 Burnt bricks 9.086 thus abolishing the land requirement problem for dumping
3 Plastic sand 1.10 plastic, Reduction in the emission of greenhouse gases by the
conversion of flue gases into synthetic oil etc.,

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 International Journal of Applied Engineering Research, ISSN 0973-4562 Vol. 11 No.3 (2016)
© Research India Publications; http/www.ripublication.com/ijaer.htm
This method is suitable for the countries which has
the difficult to dispose /recycle the plastic waste. The natural
resources consumed for the manufacturing of Plastic sand
bricks and Paver blocks are very much less when compared to
its counterparts. The manufacturing cost could be reduced
further by replacing the river sand with fly ash/quarry dust or
other waste products. Owing to the numerous advantages
further research would improve the quality and durability of
plastic sand bricks and paver blocks.
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