[GSBN] Ideas on what to do if there is no clay??

[Andy Horn]

Hi Sven & Sarah
I would wonder how sustainable coral is as a building material..? I know of
a project on some islands where they discouraged the use of coral and
developed a rammed earth method infilling with a volcanic rock in a matrix
of volcanic ash (which is polonzanic...so you can use it to partially
substitute your cement), sand and cement...not sure if you have those
ingredients? Have a copy of the building manual if you need it.
Otherwise.....

How about trying  sand bag construction...I developed a system for a project
in Zululand where all we had in the local area was sand and timber. So if
you have timber (saplings or cut timber) or bamboo you can make up vertical
ladder frames which you position on a ground plate at approx. 900mm centres
with a horizontal ladder-frame ring beam at 2,4m above finished floor
level...then you infill with bags of sand....mesh over and plaster. You can
sew up long thin pillow cases (create some work in your local community)
with suitable available bag cloth (stuff they make medical masks etc out of,
woven polypropylene etc). 
You can see pictures of this construction method on our web site  HYPERLINK
"http://www.ecodesignarchitects.co.za" www.ecodesignarchitects.co.za under
gallery under Twinstreams Environmental Centre Staff Housing. I could also
send you the building manual I developed for this building system if you are
interested.

Kind regards 
Andy Horn (Cape Town, South Africa)


-----Original Message-----
From: GSBN [mailto:GSBN at lists.greenbuilder.com] On Behalf Of Sarah Johnston
Sent: 15 March 2008 06:55 PM
To: GSBN
Subject: GSBN:Ideas on what to do if there is no clay??

A local designer (in New Zealand) is looking for ideas,

I just got back from a business exploration trip to Vanuatu, in
particular
the islands of Santo, Aore and Malo where part of my investigation
was to
see if there was any clay rich soil on the islands for adobe
building. There
isn't! There is only coral rock, coral gravel and coral sand.

They use the latter two as concrete aggregate which is quite low
strength
and the cement content has to be increased to compensate. They also use
coral rocks layed up with mortar filler to create decorative in-fill
walls
with post and beam construction.

They also use a lot of concrete blocks, again made with coral
aggregate and
the Ni-Van people are not very good block layers but fortunately very
good
plasterers!

Are any of you ingenious muddies out there aware of or can suggest
construction methods using this coral [stuff]? I am working towards
using
building methods there as cheap as possible and as easy as possible
for the
local Ni-van people to aquire skills in.

Has anyone tried making adobe from wheat paste in place of clay?  How
well would a
wheat paste block have to be protected from rain, humidity??

Could a straw, sand, wheat paste plaster work in place of clay
plaster systems??

We look forward to hearing any ideas you may have!

Thanks, Sven and Sarah Johnston





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