Factors influencing concrete quality: a survey to the principal actors of the concrete industry

Abstract

Concrete is the most used building material worldwide, involving thousands of field, academic and laboratory professionals in its production, transportation and its application, which creates a great margin of possible error that may yield in a poor quality concrete. Each professional takes care of the concrete quality according to his/her experience or academic knowledge/expertise. In order to analyze the factors that concrete workers in Barranquilla (Colombia) perceive as the most important for achieving a high-quality concrete, a survey was made to both academic and field experts with different years of experience and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) was applied to weigh the perception of each factor in the concrete quality. Results have shown that for the survey respondents one of the most important factors is the environment; this may be associated with geographic location of the city, which is in a coastal region.