Concrete is ubiquitous at all construction sights. This may make people wonder whether there is even anything in concrete that requires planning and decision making. As a matter of fact, there are several quality details of concrete which have to be examined before you finalize on choosing one.

1. CONCRETE GRADES
Types of Concrete Grade And Their Uses
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When managing a construction project or budgeting for a
renovation, you may wonder about only one variable –
money. Now, that seems great on paper but if you know
that your family will be living that very building, would you
still take this route for planning the project?
The point is – you cannot create a variable to replace
human life. Every construction project has to start with
literal ground level planning and go to the granular depths
where one decides even the building materials after a
deep analysis. One of these very fundamental materials,
which requires a careful examination before you decide
on choosing one of its several variants – is concrete.
Concrete is ubiquitous at all construction sights. This may
make people wonder whether there is even anything in
concrete that requires planning and decision making. As
a matter of fact, there are several quality details of
concrete which have to be examined before you finalize
on choosing one.
In order to understand the ideal concrete for your project,
you should know about the very basic types of concrete.
A simple way to differentiate between two large variants

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of concrete is by looking at their utility and strength. This
way, there are two basic type of concrete grades:
a. Nominal Mix Concrete: This is not the type of
concrete you will see at large construction sites or even
the ones where the site is prone to undergo tremendous
pressure.
b. Design Mix Concrete: This is the more popular mix
used at several construction sites. If you plan to build a
home which will house an entire family, this is the type of
concrete you should be dealing with.
The very basic difference between both the concrete
types stated above, apart from their utility, is the way they
are prepared. Specifically focusing on design mix, it is a
type of concrete whose constituents are lab tested with
extreme care keeping in mind the requirements of the
project and the availability of the materials in the
geography. Hence, design mix concrete is more 'tailor-
made' for the project and also helps in saving costs.
Now that you know design mix is the one you will need,
you can dive into the various types of sub-classes within

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the design mix concrete. Within design mix itself, the
different grades of concrete are divided based on their
strength. As much as you would like to see strength as an
objective quality, it is accurately measurable and the
scale used to measure the strength of a specific concrete
grade comes under Pressure per Square Inch or psi.
The strength of concrete is measured post twenty-eight
days of having applied it in order to know its strength in
real circumstances. The regular grades of concrete
which come under design mix range between sub-2200
psi to even 10,000 psi for engineered mixes. Here is a
detailed bifurcation along with the use case of each
concrete grade:
2500 PSI: This is the most basic in terms of strength and
utility. Most of the times, this grade of concrete is used for
project which will not be exposed to extreme pressure or
volatile conditions. Hence, it fits perfectly for projects
such as sidewalks and pavements. Since it is also the
cheapest of all available mixes, it works economically well
for small scale projects.
3000 PSI: Although a difference of 500 PSI may not

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seem much to a non-analytical eye, it is important from a
standardization perspective. This grade of concrete is
largely used for most of the construction projects which
are not bind by strict laws and still require a good level of
strength. It is not highly expensive and would usually fit
into construction budgets. Additionally, in terms of
application, it can be applied when it is still wet and hence
helps in increasing operational efficiencies.
3500 PSI: This is where the 500 PSI of difference actually
makes a difference. If the earlier mentioned one was for
general projects, this one is meant for projects that are
functionally meant to undergo severe pressure
throughout their lifetime. Examples of places where this
concrete is really required can be building beams and
floor slabs.
4000 PSI: This is a benchmark grade of concrete; beyond
this, the grades are used only for very specific projects
which require a very high amount of strength. If you plan
to use 4000 PSI concrete in your project, you should
ideally have a project where either you imagine a whole
lot of footfall or traffic or other forms of humongous
pressures being applied to the surface on a daily basis.

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Hence, it is ideal for pavements which attract heavy traffic
and warehouses or huge scale storage spaces.
5000 PSI: These are only meant for very specific
projects, with very specific strength needs and extreme
conditions by all means.