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Structural lightweight concrete for external walls – A challenge between the poles of
improved thermal insulation and fair faced concrete
IV Global Conference on Chemistry and Technology of Concrete - CONLIFE

Univ.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. K.-Chr. Thienel,

Institute for Construction Materials, Universität der Bundeswehr München, Neubiberg

Keywords:
lightweight concrete; fair faced concrete; execution; surface texture; compactability

Abstract
The type of concrete for external walls should not form an obstacle for freedom of design. This
is a major demand of architects, which holds for both: normal as well as lightweight concrete.
Some special characteristics of lightweight concrete have to be considered for fulfilling
essential properties. They gain increasing importance with decreasing density and in parallel
improved thermal conductivity. A close cooperation between purposeful architects and
competent concrete technologists is mandatory for transferring design visions into real
buildings even with the most extreme lightweight concretes at hand these days. Different
important aspects will be discussed in the following which have to be addressed to achieve this
goal.

Introduction
The application of structural lightweight concrete for monolithic external walls was quite
common in the sixties and early seventies of last century. They almost vanished when thermal
insulation requirements were exacerbated in the course of the oil crisis. Additionally, fair faced
concrete was no longer in vogue.

Starting in the nineties a new generation of architects rediscovered the design potential of
concrete. In order to accomplish the thermal insulation requirements they used either normal
concrete with an internal thermal insulation layer or they went for structural lightweight
concrete. The challenges for the lightweight concrete were threefold: sufficient strength,
reduced density for low thermal conductivity and a composition that should yield a high quality
surface.

Today different strength and density combinations are used to comply with the varying
demands. Strength grades ranging from LC25/28 to LC40/44 with dry concrete densities in
between 1300 and 1600 kg/m3 are applied if the focus is primarily on load bearing capacity and
a lower density should mainly help to avoid thermal bridges. Strength classes from LC12/13 to
LC20/22 with a dry density as low as 1100 kg/m3 turn out to be a good solution for e.g.
production and office buildings. The latest development are very low density lightweight
concretes. The field of application for the latter type of concrete are monolithic walls with low
thermal conductivity mainly for representative family houses. Thermal requirements lead to
wall thicknesses of 50 cm and more. Due to such wall thicknesses a strength class LC8/9 is
more than sufficient. The densities are 1100 kg/m3 and below. A most recent development
provides the strength class LC8/9 at a mean dry density of 725 kg/m3 only.

Reducing the density makes it increasingly difficult to provide a dense concrete surface similar
to that of normal concrete. Instead, especially the very low density lightweight concretes have
a so called vivid surface which is not just well accepted among architects, but sometimes
downright requested since it emphasizes the uniqueness of these concretes.
The requirements with respect to the design of fair faced concrete changed in the course of the
last decades. The contemporary taste and the technical achievements were decisive for the
implementation. The latter holds for the formwork materials and the concrete technology as
well. There are interactions between binder, separating agent and the skin of the formwork. In
parallel the concrete composition changed. This holds for instance for the binder itself, which
today is hardly pure cement but most often a mix of composite cements and one or more
supplementary cementitious materials. Most mixes utilize superplasticizers leading to very
workable but still stable concretes. The system becomes even more complex due to the reduced
density if lightweight concrete is selected for the external walls. Along with a further decreasing
density a normal fair faced surface with close and smooth texture is at least hard to accomplish
[1]. On the other hand especially the very low density lightweight concretes provide the
aforementioned very peculiar surface texture that yields a very positive assent from architects
and clients unexpected by concrete technologists.

Formwork surface
Originally, the most common fair faced concrete surface was simply taking the imprint of the
saw cut wooden planks used which is accepted again today (Figure 1). Coated plywood panels
entered the market in 1960. They facilitated a more economical solution for large-area
formwork jobs and provided a new and smooth concrete surface which gave fair faced concrete
a significantly improved image. Among others the Japanese architect Tadao Ando established
with his design of the Vitra conference pavilion in Weil/Rhine, Germany, a kind of state of the
art for fair faced concrete until today by combining the smooth fair faced concrete with
prearranged visible formwork links and anchor holes as main composition elements of the
façade [2]. Retrospective to the origin of fair faced concrete, where the materiality of concrete
came to the fore and its authentic properties were taken as given and not really controlled, the
question arises, if these almost perfect surfaces are still up-to-date and whether to proceed this
way. There is a strong tendency in modern architecture to abolish this almost mono-cultural
surface philosophy after a long successful period of application and to have a shot at new
unconsumed alternatives [3].

Figure 1: Fair faced lightweight concrete (LC12/12 D1,2) designed with saw cut wooden
planks, community center Erftstadt, Germany [4]

It is mandatory for normal weight external concrete walls to fulfill the thermal requirements by
means of integrated thermal insulation layers. This requirement can be accomplished as well
2
with monolithic lightweight concrete walls. Erecting monolithic walls with these increasingly
lighter lightweight concretes yields a new kind of material authenticity and mobilizes
significant synergetic effects that result in a new understanding in designing with concrete. This
move became almost tangible in the reactions upon publications to than newly build examples
in Switzerland [5] and Germany [3]. There is a growing acceptance for this specific kind of
surface texture that some publications even refer to a „LC12/13“-optic, which is copied for
other projects using a special formwork (Figure 2) [6].

Figure 2: Detail of a lightweight concrete fair faced surface in LC12/13-optic (left), part
of the building (right) [6]

Concrete composition
It is often hard to distinguish on a first glance just from the concrete surface between common
structural lightweight and normal weight concrete, since the main difference is the replacement
of the normal aggregate (e.g. quarzitic gravel) against lightweight aggregate (LWA) such as
expanded shale or expanded clay, which is not visible at the surface. In cases, where thermal
insulation is not relevant, the replacement is limited to the coarse aggregate even down to a
density class D1.4 (blue circles in Figure 3). Here, natural sand comprises the fine aggregate.
Such lightweight concretes are predominantly used for civil engineering projects such as
bridges, for slabs or internal walls in offices and living quarters as well as for precast elements
such as bigger garages. Lowering the weight is in the foreground in all these applications. Such
lightweight concretes will be ignored in the following considerations.

The replacement of the natural sand by lightweight sand yields an additional reduction in
concrete dry density of approximately 200 kg/m3 (empty orange diamonds in Figure 3). A
further benefit of the lightweight sand is an essentially improved thermal property which opens
new fields of application to these so call pure lightweight concretes, since the lightweight
aggregates yield a lower thermal conductivity as compared to normal aggregates. The pure
lightweight concretes can be further optimized, if one makes use of the means concrete
technology offers today (modern superplasticizers and supplementary cementitious materials
and incorporates expanded glass as LWA for very low densities (orange squares in Figure 3)).
The performance differences of the three aforementioned types of lightweight concrete with
respect to strength are clearly depicted in Figure 3. The values kind of reflect the technical
limits. Reducing the density lowers the strength, but it also goes along with a lower thermal
conductivity. Figure 4 displays the correlation between dry concrete density and thermal
conductivity. It becomes clear that reducing concrete density yields an advantage in the thermal
design of a building. Both aspects – strength and thermal conductivity – play an important role
for selecting a lightweight concrete. The correlation is simplified given via the dry density.

3
Figure 3: Correlation between cube strength and dry density for lightweight concretes with
different compositions [7]

Figure 4: Exemplary design values of thermal conductivity of lightweight concrete

according to the relevant German standard DIN 4108-4 and to a technical approval [8]

Three different application and synergetic areas exist for light and very light concrete depending
on the combination of required compressive strength and thermal conductivity needed in order
to adapt to the building physics requirements.

• Highly stressed facades of office buildings with many window and door openings
demand higher strength and are realized in a concrete density range between 1,3 and 1,6
kg/m3 (right oval in Figure 3).
• Less stressed facades which either have thicker walls, less stories or less openings are
executed in the density range between 1,0 and 1,3 kg/m3 (central oval in Figure 3).
• The best thermal insulation with very light concretes is increasingly used for exclusive
private houses. Their external walls are executed in densities ranging from 1,0 down to

4
 0,80 kg/m3 and even less (left oval in Figure 3). Below 0,80 kg/m3 such lightweight
concretes are no longer covered by existing standards for structural lightweight concrete
in Europe. Since the thermal insulation requirements lead to rather thick walls, the
achievable strength is usually high enough to provide sufficient load bearing capacity
for single- or two-story houses. In some projects executed the concrete strength was
even below a strength class LC8/9, which is the lowest strength class that was covered
by existing or old standards for LC [9-11]. Such lightweight concrete ranges somewhere
in between structural lightweight concrete (LC) and no-fines lightweight concrete with
open porous structure [12]. Thus special considerations are necessary regarding a
suitable design concept. This requires more or less automatically a technical approval
or an approval on an individual basis [13].

Surface quality and compactability

The decision to use a lightweight concrete for a building often calls for compromises. The idea
of having a smooth fair faced concrete implies an immaculate almost void free surface.
Following this design idea requires additional efforts for the construction operation even for
normal weight concrete. It is more difficult but possible with lightweight concrete as well
(Figure 5). Lightweight concrete damps the energy of vibrators during compaction due to its
low density. The lower the density the more effort is needed for compacting the concrete. As a
simple rule of thumbs one can assume that the range of influence of concrete vibrators decreases
proportionally to the density ratio of lightweight concrete in relation to normal weight concrete.
A good project planning and disposition together with qualified personal on site will permit a
successful unerring execution even of demanding structured fair faced concrete (Figure 6 and
Figure 7).

Figure 5: Close-up of the fair faced concrete (LC 12/13 D1,2) of regional and district court
Frankfurt/Oder [14]

5
 Figure 6: Detail of the designed Figure 7: Detail of the external wall of a
surface of the Goethe-Gymnasium work and machine shop on the university campus
Regensburg [15] Klein-Altendorf, Bonn [16]

In the case of lightweight concrete with very low density producing an almost void free surface
is for most contractors close to impossible even with increased efforts. Here, it is often more a
question of a homogenous appearance of the surface by avoiding bigger voids or even cavities
on one hand and locally perfect smooth surfaces on the other hand. Nevertheless, this naturally
looking vivid surface became kind of brand mark of very low density lightweight concretes and
is more and more especially asked for by architects (Figure 8).

Figure 8: Example of a „vivid“ concrete surface of the residential house Trager [17]

6
Colored surfaces
Even minor variations in water-binder-ratio influence the brightness of a concrete surface and
in consequence its colorfulness. Water-binder-ratio should not exceed 0,55 for this reason and
any variation in water-binder-ratio is limited for fair faced concrete to 0,02 [18]. This is an
enormous challenge for lightweight concrete which becomes immediately clear if one considers
the water absorption of coarse lightweight aggregate and especially of crushed lightweight sand
which may be as high as 45 wt-% for some types. The resulting color of the concrete becomes
rather blotty (Figure 9). The color of the sand used is another critical factor. The color of
crushed expanded clay and expanded shale sand ranges from dark brown to anthracite. Here
again, the fruitful cooperation between concrete technologist and architect can result in suitable
mix designs with bright surfaces (Figure 10).

Figure 9: Red lightweight concrete of a fire fighter house in Vierschach, Swiss (Photo:
Gustav Willeit) [19]

Figure 10: Colored lightweight concrete (LC12/13 D1,2) with shell limestone type
character of the New Apostolic church in Pliezhausen (Photo: Markus Ebener) [20]

7
LC7/8 D0,725 – Top of the edge in current lightweight concrete
technology [13]
The potential of structural lightweight concrete with very low density was proven earlier by
Schlaich. The mix design for his “infra lightweight concrete“ [21] is based on another
lightweight concrete with comparable density that combined several expanded clay fractions
and was developed within the framework of a research project dealing with a steel-lightweight
concrete sandwich construction [22]. No requirement with regard to surface quality was set for
this initial lightweight concrete. This necessary modification was accomplished by
Bonnen/Schlaich and successfully implemented in a private house in Berlin [23].

A further development of these ultra lightweight structural concretes was implemented in

Munich for the architect Thalmair’s own single family house [13]. Here, an approval on an
individual basis was required since density and strength class of the lightweight concrete were
below the limits of the current European standards [10, 11].

Mix design
The mix design of Thalmair’s house (Table 1) is based on expanded glass and expanded clay
and used a combination of CEM II/B-S 42,5 N and CEM III/A 32,5 N-LH/NA together with
fly ash and silica slurry as binder. This combination was necessary for providing sufficient
demolding strength but did already reduce the heat of hydration to a certain extend.
Nevertheless, a significant temperature rise was still expected since the external walls were 50
cm thick and the concrete’s thermal conductivity was low [24]. Mock-ups test confirmed this
expectation. Finally, these tests led additionally to the partial replacement of mixing water by
flake ice in order to limit the maximum concrete temperature during hydration to 68 °C. The
water absorption of the LWA was compensated by additional 27 l/m3 of water. This water was
added but not considered the mix in (Table 1) since it did not increase to concrete volume [13].

Table 1: Mix design

volume mass
dm3/m3 kg/m3
Lightweight aggregate 568 215
Liaver 1-4 mm and Liapor 2,9E 2-6 mm
Cement 113 350
Admixtures 64 118
Fly ash, Silica slurry (solid content)
Water (including slurry content) 149 149
Air content 106
Sum 1000 832

Fresh and hardened concrete properties

Consistency was determined according to EN 12350-5 [25] (flow table test) and EN 12350-4
[26] (degree of compactability). The latter was more sensitive (Figure 11). The first test method
can be used later for quality control on site, but since its results strongly depend on the concrete
density, it is not suited for lightweight concrete for determining a consistency class. This was
declared based on the degree of compactability. The mix was self-compacting until 60 minutes
after the start of mixing according to the degree of compactability (consistency class C4). The
concrete delivered on site had consistency class C3. Its effective workability on site confirmed
that the results of the degree of compactability measurements are representative for such mixes
other than the flow table results which indicated a stiffer mix (class F2).

8
Figure 11: Development of flow spread and degree of compactability until 90 minutes after
start of mixing

Compressive strength was determined on cylinders (150/300 mm) and 150-mm-cubes

according DIN EN 12390-3 [27]. Here, the casting procedure is decisive for strength and
density of the specimens due to impact of the initial water absorption of the lightweight
aggregates. The mean dry density (d) at 28 days was 0,749 kg/m3 which resulted in
compressive strength values of 12,2 and 14,2 MPa respectively (Figure 12). The variations in
the strength results beyond 28 days did always go along with deviations in concrete density.
The strength results led to a strength class designation LC8/9.

Modulus of elasticity (Elcm) [28] was 5,3 GPa at 28 d. This was significantly higher than
predicted in the European concrete standard [11], while the measured splitting tensile strength
(fct,sp) acc. [29] of 0,88 MPa correlated well with the estimation.

Creep and shrinkage were measured following the procedure given in [30]. The results (Figure
13) correspond well with data published by Schlaich and Zareef [21].

Thermal insulation is very important for such lightweight concrete. Thermal conductivity 10tr
was measured acc. DIN EN 12664 [31] on samples having a dry density of 0,723 kg/m3. It was
0,185 W/(mK) which is in line with values obtained for other projects [13].

9
Figure 12: Development of cylinder and cube strength

Figure 13: Strains during creep loading

10
Execution
Even though this newly developed LC8/9 D0,725 has a very good workability, its low density
nevertheless is a challenge on site. This holds for the compaction during placing as well as for
the vulnerability of its surface. Thus special care must be taken when selecting the separating
agents. When stripping the formwork the concrete’s corners and edges are easily damaged
because of its low strength. Finally, a hydrophobic agent was applied as additional surface
protection and is strongly recommended for other projects since the lightweight concrete has a
high air content and unintended water absorption would have a negative impact on the thermal
insulation properties as well as the long term appearance of the building. The resulting surface
quality (Figure 14) is meanwhile accepted and often especially asked for by architects and
future building owners.

Figure 14: Finished private house Thalmair (© InformationsZentrum Beton/Peters

Fotodesign)

Today, the combination of concrete competence, the right material selection and thorough
preparation of the job yield even for extremely challenging lightweight concretes with very low
dry density such as a LC8/9 D0,725 very lively (Figure 15) as well as almost perfect surfaces
(Figure 16).

11
 Figure 15: Surface of a LC8/9 Figure 16: Surface texture and edge quality
D0,725 with vivid texture and of a column cast in LC8/9 D0,725 in
visible casting layers (Photo: highest fair-faced concrete quality
Matthias Richter) (Photo: Björn Callsen)

Summary
The fair faced surface of structural lightweight concrete with low thermal conductivity can be
very unique. At the end of the day it is up to the successful ensemble acting of architects,
concrete technologists, the construction team on site as well as the mutual understanding of the
partners intentions and abilities to transfer an initial idea into a remarkable structure. Structural
lightweight concrete leaves a lot of space for these ideas. There is no creative limit or obstacle
set for owners and architects even in case of the current performance maximum in very low
density concrete technology. As always, it depends what the players involved make out of it.

Literature
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 28. EN 12390-13, Testing hardened concrete – Part 13: Determination of secant modulus
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