Hey... I am no expert on construction techniques. I have worked in construction, mind you. My father, a carpenter by trade, rose through the ranks of Canada's Federal Government to become Deputy of Public Works in the 1950s, ten years after getting his carpenter's licence through Ryerson Polytechnical Institute in Toronto, Ontario. He later gave up government office work, which bored him to migraine headaches, to become a very successful general contractor in Ottawa, Canada. How successful? - well, at one point he was a multi-millionaire. Not bad for a poor Jewish kid in the anti-semitic world that was Canada. But I digress. The point really is I was exposed to construction at an early age, and when I was 14 years old, my father gave me a job working in the drywall business. So I know a little bit about that sort of work. I became an academic in later life, but I will always be grateful to my dad for who he is and what he taught me about using my hands to build things.
The premise of this blog is really to say there are right ways to construct things, and then there are the ones that just cause problems. In order to construct something right, it behooves the individual to gather some skill before application. Otherwise, it can be dangerous. I mean it: who knows what the concrete mix was in the catastrophe in Bangladesh where hundreds of people lost their lives in a building complex that collapsed? What standards were used to ensure safety of those hapless souls? Was the construction done up to code? What shortcuts were taken that resulted in the unnecessary loss of life? So, it's not a trivial matter: there are rules and codes from which to build with; if amateurs are set the task to construct something without any sort of training, what do you expect the outcome to be?
This post is about making concrete... the dubious way. By that I mean even though the good intentions of the community who were involved in making and pouring concrete for a pad to protect an adobe house from termites, in the final analysis, it wasn't done very well. The mix varied: one time the ratio was 11 pails of sand to a half a bag of portland cement, plus an unspecified amount of water, with some stones thrown in, to 12 or more pails of sand, a half bag of portland and no stones, and so on and so forth. This type of variation, to my mind, on a set formula to make concrete means, in the final analysis, the concrete will not be consistent and at risk of cracks and failure.
So, I wish to add this caveat to the pictorial demonstration presented in this post on making concrete: this work was done by amateurs, and as such, not to be used as a model for your own projects, unless, of course, you know what you are doing. It's all fun and games, until someone gets hurt. So, please bear that in mind...
Making Concrete
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| Peggy surveying the area where concrete will be poured |
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| Pi Dao prepares the ground for the concrete |
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Trying to clear off loose soil from the walls to prevent termites
from tunnelling into the structure |
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| Pun Pun community members all pitch in to make concrete |
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| Mixing sand with portland cement |
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Sand mixed at a ratio of 11-12 parts sand to
1/2 bag of portland cement |
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| Stones are added to the mix |
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| Nate starts to apply the concrete |
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Smoothing the concrete as it is poured. Note some areas are
really wet, while other areas are not. Hmm... |
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| Concrete pad is done. Note the inconsistency in the mix. |
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| Looks uneven |
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| Would you be happy with this job? |
Building places to live may not be the exclusive domain of licenced architects, designers, engineers, carpenters - and so on and so forth - but it certainly is the domain of those who have some idea of what they are doing. Before doing any sort of work where people's lives are involved, do some research, apprentice, learn from those who have experience before trying this stuff out by yourself.
Here is a wikihow web page showing the usual procedure for making concrete:
In the final analysis, it's fun to do this sort of work, but ensure you have someone who knows what they are doing to guide you.
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