Incorporating bottle bricks into aircrete block
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I want to incorporate bottle bricks into the aircrete blocks to make a ring of light around the ceiling of the dome.
My structural engineer objected that it would be hard to cover with fabric and would reduce the strength achieved with the fabric. Instead he agreed to 3-4 500mmx500mm sections of bottle bricks on each dome.
I have been making blocks incorporating a number of bottle bricks, dipping each glass brick into the latex solution before putting them in the brick. Some bricks fail and split around the bottles, others are both waterproof and solid.
Has anyone else tried this? And do you have any suggestions? -
When you say "bottle bricks", do you mean bricks made with whole bottles, or are you melting the bottles down to make glass bricks ? Can you share some pics of the successful bricks and failed bricks so we can see what your talking about?
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@upwinger
Hi, I am making the aircrete blocks in forms so they come out as individual 33cm x 22cm blocks with (mostly) square corners. I have been grinding the top off the bottle and joining two halves with waterproof tape, dipping in latex and incorporating into the block when poured. I don’t know how to get pix from my iPhone to here. But they let in lotsa light.
Noni -
@noni Noni can you send me the pics via WhatsApp. Our class of May 2018 had a group site. I really would be grateful to see the pics & I’m sure the others would as well. 831-428-3293. Thank you Tumaini
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@Tumaini I’m not on WhatsApp and abandoned the bottle bricks in aircrete bocks idea pretty soon. A lot of the blocks split. Others leaked around the edge of the bottle. Others were just ugly. I did try to evenly space and reinforce the bottles by wrapping them with wire but a lot of the set unevenly and the whole ring seemed more work than it was worth.
After consulting with Gabe I’ll finish the dome then cut portholes in the roo and lay bottlebricks into the cavity with mortar. That is some time away though. Thanks for your interest.