Ram Mandir temple has been started to construct successfully since 2020. It is located in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh. Uttar Pradesh is a state in India that often experiences earthquakes. Because it’s in an earthquake-prone area, there are many things to think about before building anything over here. Before they built the temple, they checked the soil. The test showed that the soil wasn’t good for making a big and strong temple. So, how were they able to build this huge temple? It’s a bit confusing, right? Another interesting fact is that the temple is made only of stone, without any iron or steel.
Ram Mandir Temple Secret Foundation
How did they do it? What’s the secret? Let’s find out. The first step in building something is creating a strong foundation. That’s because the foundation helps spread the weight of the building evenly onto the ground. In the case of this temple, they tested the soil before making the foundation. They discovered that the soil wasn’t solid and had loose sand. Loose sand can’t support a heavy building, so the engineers dug 14 meters deep over 6 acres and removed all the loose sand. After that, they used a special type of concrete called Roller Compacted Concrete (RCC) and applied it in 56 layers.
What is Concrete?
Let’s talk about what concrete is. After water, one of the most used things in the world is concrete. It’s made by mixing cement, sand, and other stuff. It’s important to get the right mix because each ingredient has a special role. Cement is what turns the mix from liquid to solid. The strength of the concrete depends on how much water and cement are used, known as the water-cement ratio. In regular concrete, the ratio is usually between 0.4 and 0.6. For example, if you have 100 kilograms of cement, you’d need 40 liters of water (for a 0.4 ratio).
After making the concrete, it dries and gets hard. This happens because of a chemical reaction called hydration. Water reacts with two parts in the cement, tricalcium silicate and dicalcium silicate, and releases a gel called calcium silicate hydrate. This gel acts like glue, holding the sand and gravel in the concrete together. Over time, the gel turns into crystals that make the concrete even stronger. These crystals fill the spaces in the concrete, making it denser and more robust. Keeping the gaps small prevents impurities from getting in, making the concrete even stronger.
Hydration turns the concrete mix into something like stone. To make this process work better, you need the right temperature and moisture. There’s a lot of heat produced during hydration, which can cause small cracks. To prevent this, water is sprayed during construction, and wet bags like gunny sacks cover the concrete. This keeps the right amount of moisture, and the chemical reaction continues, forming more calcium silicate hydrate gel. This process, called curing, stops further cracks from happening, giving extra strength to buildings.
What is Roller Compacted Concrete(RCC)?
Ayodhya Ram Mandir Construction: Now, let’s talk about the Roller Compacted Concrete (RCC) used in the Ram temple. It goes through the same hydration process as like normal concrete, but here, the water-cement ratio is less, around 0.35 to 0.5. This means that for 100 kilograms of cement, only 35 liters of water are used. However, more sand (fine aggregates) is used, making it stronger and more durable.
You might wonder if concrete would be stronger without any water, but that’s not true. Water turns cement into a paste, acting like glue to bind the other materials in concrete tightly. So, water is crucial, but the amount varies for each concrete mix.
When making regular concrete for construction, we use tools like damping rods and vibrators to compact it. However, Roller Compacted Concrete is compacted differently using a heavy road roller, removing air gaps between the concrete particles to make it denser and stronger. Since the strength of this concrete is compared to rocks, it’s also called artificial rocks. RCC is commonly used in dams and pavement constructions. The foundation of the Ram temple is built with RCC, increasing its compressive strength, meaning it can handle a lot of weight without breaking.
Is RCC preferred for house construction?
RCC (Roller Compacted Concrete) is much stronger. So, why not build every house with RCC? Well, we can, but there’s a catch. We need to use four pillars instead of two because while RCC has high compressive strength, its tensile strength is low. To fix this, the Ram temple used pink sandstones from Rajasthan to build the pillars. There are 392 pillars in total. They chose stones over steel because steel rusts easily, and the lifespan of stones is longer than iron and steel.
The stones were specifically selected because they don’t easily break or crack when pressed. To protect the temple from soil moisture, granite stones were brought from Karnataka and Telangana to construct a 21-foot base in a style called Nagara. This style is commonly used in temples in northern parts of India.
Using only stones for construction, the temple is believed to stand for 1000 years without maintenance. It can even withstand an earthquake of magnitude 6.5. Materials from each state were used in building the temple, and Rameswaram donated a 620 kg bell. Initially, people thought the land wasn’t suitable for such a big project, but engineers skillfully solved the problem using engineering techniques. That’s why the temple is considered an engineering marvel.