Tokyo Cement Company Conducts a Training Program for Technical Officers of Colombo Municipal Council (CMC)

Tokyo Cement Company recently conducted a one-day Training Program on ‘Cement and Concrete’, for a group of Technical Officers of the Colombo Municipal Council (CMC).  31 Technical Officers participated in this training program, held in collaboration with the CMC Training Division at their Training Center at Madampitiya.

Eng. Janaka Perera – General Manager RMC Marketing of TOKYO SUPERMIX, made a presentation on the Tokyo Cement Group’s Product & Business Portfolio.  He highlighted the paradigm shift that has taken place on the quality requirements of Concrete for the high-rise building projects in Colombo, and the leading role played by Tokyo Supermix in meeting these challenges.  He further related the influence this quality shift in concrete formulation has, on the construction industry as a whole, with the widespread use of Blended Cement, M-Sand and new generation admixtures.  He made particular reference to the superior quality Blended Hydraulic Cement (BHC) manufactured by Tokyo Cement, using the newly installed ‘Dynamic Separator’ for Fly Ash Classification and ‘Turbo Blender’ for manufacturing of BHC.  Eng. Janaka Perera further explained how NIPPON PRO CEMENT, the premier brand of cement, has enabled Tokyo Supermix to manufacture high strength concrete grades, such as C85 and C70 self-compacting concrete for Cinnamon Life project and Avic Astoria projects respectively.

Mr. Yasas Wickramage, Manager Product Development at the Construction Research Center, did a presentation on various Cement types and the recommended uses of each type in accordance with the SLS guidelines.  He explained the benefits of Blended Hydraulic Cement in marine and marshy environments and the limitations of using Limestone Cement.  He further discussed the cement manufacturing process, brief history of cement as a major building material and factors affecting durability of plastering mixes.  Mr. Janith Kaviraj, Product Testing Manager, Construction Research Center, also delivered a presentation on Concrete Manufacturing and Quality Assurance.  He explained the process controls applied in concrete manufacturing and the importance of maintaining the quality aspects such as water cement ratio and selection of cement and aggregates.  He explained the M-Sand manufacturing process as an alternative to the scarce and expensive river sand and use of appropriate admixtures to obtain fresh state properties.  The methodology of checking fresh state properties (workability) and final properties were also discussed.  Additionally, he discussed the usage of supplementary cementitious materials in concrete manufacturing, such as fly ash, slag and silica fume.  Mr. Kaviraj also discussed the quality issues associated with fresh and hardened concrete.

Eng. Janaka Perera concluded the session with a presentation on the interactions between Cement and Admixtures, in retaining the workability of concrete.  Eng. Rajasekera, Deputy Director – Training (Technical) of the Colombo Municipal Council, coordinated this training program on behalf of the Training Division of CMC.