Clay hollow Bricks

[kraghum]

Today evening i went to POROTHERM office, they have 8 dealers, and anything less than 1Lakh bricks will eb handled by these dealers. They did explained me finer details. i am now more towards using the DRYFIX solution. My meeting with my engineer is moved to tomorrow. plan to convince them on this.

They also given me address of a house built near Mount carmel college in Palace orchards, which belongs to an architect but using complete DRYFIX

raghu

[hrman]

I saw on their website about how we can drill nails into the porotherm bricks. Its possible, but you need to use a long nail, which will penetrate into the other end of the hollow section inside too. Or better still, stick to concrete columns or the cement in between the bricks for nails.

[biddappa_c_b]

Hi, I am also planning to construct a house soon. Please let me know more details if anyone is planning to use Prototherem bricks with dryfix.

cheers

[bipinchandra2n]

Hi kraghum,

I am also thinking about constructing my house with Clay hollow blocks, but i recently met a person who had constructed the building with the same materials, he said that currently weinerberger is facing a lot of shortage in supplying the blocks, is it true.

[kraghum]

I met their Representative, but i never asked this question. will check though

[bhabhu]

Hi all,
Please can anybody give more information about ABT clay blocks or porotherm blocks or Hurudi blocks. what is the expansion of ABT clay blocks. Where it is available? What will be the cost of ABT clay blocks., Please share some more information. is clay blocks cheaper than conventional construction? Is any skilled experienced workers needed? if so please share their contact details.

[bhabhu]

Cost:

Material cost is lower, labor cost is higher, especially if you want to leave the bricks exposed. Labor has to make sure the brickwork looks pretty, hence will have to tie a thread and make sure the cement mortar is even between the bricks.

We completed our house in Oct 2011. So it has been about 15 months.

According to the CPRI compressive strength reports for porotherm brick, it is deem safe for G+1. Porotherm also mentions that it is safe for G+1. My house has longer spans hence I do employ semi-pillared construction. the structural elements were the same for normal brick work. I have planned only for G+1 and have no plans of constructing more than G+1. No fan of constructing more floors for rental income.

What is it that is driving you towards Porotherm?

In my case it was.
1. looks - I like natural brick & tiled roof, look on buildings
2. Environmentally better than regular bricks - Since they use 20% fly ash and are hollow, they use less top soil, which is precious.
3. Cooler buildings due to hollow bricks.
4. The redbricks do not have consistency. The bricks at the bottom are burnt more, while those at the top are burnt less. So the strenght of the brick varies in a given lot, while these bricks are produced using modern machines, have consistency. So each brick has more or less the same physical properties.

Please can you give more information about ABT clay blocks. what is the expansion of ABT clay blocks. Where it is available? What will be the cost of ABT clay blocks., Please share some more information. is clay blocks cheaper than conventional construction? Is any skilled experienced workers needed? if so please share their contact details.

[kraghum]

finally after lot of discussions, our architect was against using poro therm, she had her own arguments and some how Porto therm guys couldn't answer to those questions. in end i wanted something more close to Mud so decided to go for compressed stabilized bricks.
Cost is same for Burnt and CSEB, but we may save some cost on plastering if we leave out the walls without plastering (we might leave one side but, don't like the plain wall as the CSEB walls are bit dull for our requirements), but they offer good heat insulation and mental we get satisfaction that we are doing our own bit for environment

Raghu

[santro]

Raghu,

For benefit of others can you please share the questions raised by your architect. As this could be one of the cons of using portho blocks.

[maheshv]

There was on-going construction near my house (which is also under construction) with full porotherm brick, initially they kept outside wall fully exposed and inside plastered, now I see that they are plastering outside wall too after electrical work. Looking at it I feel bad, because it looked so good with exposed brick earlier.

My suggestion is instead of full house, use porothem only at specific sides like front for elevation, work with your engineer to plan and avoid electric wire path at those location