Development of bamboocrete multi-purpose panels for affordable housing system

Due to high cost of construction materials and technologies, it is a crucial challenge to deliver a decent mass housing. Cost of construction will be reduced if locally ready available raw materials are used at its optimum. Concrete needs to be reinforced due to its weak in tension. Bamboo is the best alternative as reinforcing material to replace steel as it is sustainable and low in cost. The objective of this study is to determine the physical and mechanical properties of local bamboo, Gigantochloa Scortechinii and its durability. It was found that after one year, the strength of bamboo is almost the same and top section of the bamboo culm was recorded as having the highest strength among other sections. Furthermore, the structural lightweight concrete was designed with the use of natural perlite aggregate and palm kernel shell (PKS) that provide an advantage of more lightweight material and to obtain more economical concrete. It is possible to produce 10 MPa compressive strength by using perlite and 16 MPa by using PKS. This paper also assesses the development of affordable bamboocrete multi-purpose panel. Bamboo is used to reinforce the lightweight concrete to form a load-bearing multi-purpose panel. The panels axial load strength are more than 100kN (10 ton) and ultimate bending load of between 32.51 to 35.20kN. The usage of bamboo as the reinforcement in the concrete panel greatly contributed to its bending strength. It showed its flexibility and ductility when the bamboocrete panel returned to its original straight form after the load removal. Total cost of the panel can be reduced by 14% when using bamboocrete panel with PKS as compared to the lightweight PKS concrete reinforced with steel bar, and bamboocrete panel is 23% lighter.