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Slag cement concrete offers many advantages that lead to its intensive use in the Construction Industry in Belgium but it would present a higher sensitivity to cracking at early ages than Portland cement concrete. This preliminary study focuses on the evolution of autogenous and drying shrinkage and their effect on cracking sensitivity at early ages of slag cement concretes. Moreover, the influence of an extra period of the curing time on the total shrinkage is also underlined. In this way, various slag cement concretes were studied and compared to reference Portland cement concretes characterized by similar rheological and mechanical performances in free and restrained conditions. This experimental study highlights the role of the autogenous deformations in the evolution of the total shrinkage of slag cement concrete at early ages. Actually, our experimental data show that its evolution in terms of magnitude and kinetics is very different from that of Portland cement concrete. It was also observed that the slag cement concrete under restrained condition cracks earlier (between 15 and 60 days) than Portland cement concrete (after several months). This experimental research has also shown that the total shrinkage of slag cement concrete can be decreased partially by prolonging the curing time.

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