THESIS ABSTRACT

Abstract

Quality of workmanship is an important factor to determine the quality of construction. It is especially important in construction of buildings like public schools. In this research, the quality of workmanship has been studied in the selected public school building construction in Kathmandu and Bhaktpaur which were funded by USAID. The objectives of the thesis are - to find the existing quality of workmanship of RCC works; to identify the causes that affects the quality in RCC works; and to suggest the possible ways to improve the quality of RCC works. A survey with the personnel of client, consultant and contractor was carried out regarding current workmanship status in building construction, causes of poor quality of concrete and possible measures to improve workmanship was done with a questionnaire set. The Relative Importance Index (RII) was calculated to determine the causes of poor quality and the possible ways to improve the workmanship. Similarly, the current status of workmanship was compared with the standard defined by the Indian Standard IS456:2000. The causes that affects the quality in RCC works is due to poor storage of materials, lack of skilled manpower and inferior workmanship and usage of reinforcement bars. Three major possible ways to improve quality of workmanship are mixing of ingredient materials in correct proportion, training to workers and tests like slump test and cube test to check the performance of concrete works. Kendall’s coefficient of concordance to improve quality of works was found to be 0.72. Result shows that the present working practice is satisfactory, but not good enough to be as per the standard.

Keywords

Quality, Workmanship, RCC works, Building Construction