What Is Readymix Concrete?

Concrete of any kind is an interesting, curious and very useful item. Because of the unique properties of water and dry cement, human beings have been able to produce some of the strongest and heaviest buildings and other objects using a few separate items that are generally easy to come by. Mixing the correct amounts of cement, sand, gravel/rock and water will lead to a solid, almost unbreakable piece of concrete.

Cement is widely known as a “binder.” Like a few other substances, it has properties that change when combined with water, for instance. It dries and sticks together more solidly than a similar earth-based item such as clay dust. Human beings have used this mix of items for centuries to produce structures for living, working and even for transporting (bridges, aqueducts etc.)

For years it was necessary to have a supply of sand, cement, gravel or rock and clean water at a particular location in order to produce quality concrete. While this was not impossible, it was often impractical due to poor road.

Some construction projects are so large, and need so much concrete, that temporary mixing plants are constructed at the building site. This eliminates the need to transport a prepared mix in a special truck. Additional supplies of raw materials can be brought to the site in bulk and mixed in the temporary plant as needed.

Ready-mix concrete is produced in amounts that fill a certain space or cover a certain area. For this reason, it is measured in cubic yards or cubic meters. Larger transport/mixing trucks might carry 7 cubic meters of mix, for instance.

s or lack of trucks or wagons to haul the raw materials. Then the workers had to mix and pour on-site, which presented problems if the weather was bad or if the cement and sand could not be stored properly (dry).

But men, being the imaginative creatures they are, came up with the idea of ready-mix concrete. The time and mess required to produce concrete on site has all but been replaced by the ready-mix industry. Special production plants and trucks have become quite common as the ready-mix concrete industry grew.

Using the same ingredients – cement, gravel or rock (also called aggregate), sand and water, the mixture is prepared at a distant plant and put into a specially designed truck. These trucks have rounded “hoppers) or tanks that revolve and keep the mixture moving as it is being transported. For many years, workers used small versions of these same hoppers on site. The size was increased and the hoppers were placed on truck frames to make them portable.

Ready-mix plant operators can vary ingredients somewhat, to produce a particular type of finished product. For instance, some builders and contractors might want their concrete to dry faster than another mix, so the ready-mix plant adds ingredients that help “cure” the concrete. The greatest step forward, in addition to truck transportation, has been the ability to keep large supplies of sand, gravel and cement at one site, close to a reliable source of clean water.

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