Today we started laying pop cans for the second side of the bond beam form. Last night we screened gravel and ran a string line. This morning at 8:00 am we started and it went very fast!
At 10:30 the sheep shearer (Phillip) showed up to shear or yearling ewes, Ginny, Zoom, Twirl-A-Girl and Whiskers. Philip made it look easy, taking off Zooms wool coat in one piece!
Here are some photos of the day.
Sandra,
Now that I see the walls in close up, I have a question. How do you keep the cans from getting squished and losing their shape from the weight of the cement? I guess up to now I had assumed you were flattening them, but obviously not.
Cheers,
Carla
Carla, it takes quite a bit to squash a can. We do squish them a little so that we don’t create a cyndrical tube that they can slid out of.
Chris could answer this better but you have to imagine the force of the concreate (the load) is spread out over the surface of the can and the can itself has a lot of surface area. Plus the ratio of concrete to cans is pretty even..This bond beam form is only 8 inches high. When we do 8 foot high walls, we will do a foot or so at a time and then we will he to wait for the concrete to stiffen. Not to avoid squishing the cans, but to stop the concrete mixture from sloughing. No matter how stiff it is, it will still slide slowly until it hardens. That probably isn’t a great explanation, but it’s the best I can do!