Practical?? - by Symphony

Symphony — Sat Dec 30, 2006 6:39 pm

Author: Symphony

Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2006 6:39 pm

Thor451,

I am not sure I have ever heard of any sort of pre-fab concrete buildings. Pre-cast walls and floors for massive buildings yes, but the cranes and steel involved come with a big price tag, not to mention the manpower. In the event that there is in fact pre-fab concrete or stone structures for small residence I could see a lot of problems.
Ok so lets say there is pre-fab walls and floors, you need to get them to your site first and for most. This task alone will require a crane to get it to your boat or 100's of men (if you can find any willing). There are some companies who have cranes on the back of trucks but most shipping is FOB with low insurance coverage, a high price tag, and once you got it on your boat how are you going to get it off? If you're really ambitious you could maybe buy a UNIC Crane and bring it with the load (http://www.unic-cranes.co.uk/) they can lift up to 3 tons and can fit into a 2-foot doorway. Your guess is as good as mine on what the price tag for that is, but don't count on it being cheap.
Now we need to talk about this boat you just put a massive load of concrete or stone onto. It obviously has to be big enough to hold all the weight. A barge big enough would easily exceed $10 000 a day, so you need to make sure you plan it all out right too, and don't expect it to always go as planned either. Mother Nature changes without any notice and can bring everything to a stand still. It won�t be a quick ride due to the weight, depending on what kid of a motor you're pushing. I brought out 60 bags of concrete to an island this summer in one of many trips. We used an oversized floating dock with a small motor mounted. The trip took over an hour for as little as 2 miles, but you wouldn't want your baby pushing that much weight either. On another trip we took 30 or so with a 20-horse aluminum boat and it took maybe half the time.
I think that pretty much rules it out as being a practical, cost effective solution to build your dream escape. Maybe you have a lot of money to throw around, and in that case it might be an interesting project. Does a big massive concrete structure really belong in such a place though? I think it'd be an eye sore myself. It would disrupt all of the natural tones and beauty of your surroundings. Stone on the other hand would be very nice but there are better ways of using it to build...
A good approach to designing an island escape is to look at the natural surroundings first and pull ideas from that. If there is a prevalent stone in the area try and source some out, you could use cinder blocks as a base and mask them with a thin covering of that stone, but it wont be a fast process. There will be a lot of trips, rebar to be cut, numerous bags of concrete that will have to be mixed, and lots of sweat. You can only lay 4 feet of cinder block at once until it dries. The weight of the block's squeeze the mortar out other wise and you DO NOT want your walls to crack or structure and support is compromised. You can use marine grade cement as a bonding agent if you wanted to speed the process up, it will dry in half an hour even if submersed in water.
Another approach would be to build forms and pour it all. This would be risky and again lots of manpower needed. Mixing would have to be done manually on an island with several electric mixers and a close eye kept on the consistency of your mix. With concrete foundations/walls the pour has too be continuous if a section dries before the rest is in place they will not bond to each other and that whole section would have to be taken out and redone.

I hope that helps answer some of your questions

Building Materials For A Dwelling ? - by Thor451

Thor451 — Fri Dec 29, 2006 4:40 pm

Author: Thor451

Posted: Fri Dec 29, 2006 4:40 pm

Hello Islanders,
in seeing the islands for sale on this website, it is clear that houses are usually made of wood. but does anyone know what the cost would be for pre fab housing in concrete or stone ? i raise the question because of the complex values of stone or concrete.

Both are easy to form into a dwelling, offer a chance for the person to instill materials which can resist cracking, and increase insulation values. and the best part of these materials is simple, they are clearly fire proof ! i would think these materials would be a clear choice for the new islander.

But i would like to know if others have thought about this , and have they come up with any conclusions on their own ? and remember with the adding of materials like shredded rubber tires, the concrete or stone would resist cracking for colder temps, and would have the ability to breathe, making it a better resistor to such normal events like earthquakes and sea storms. and if you use lime mortar with this project, the house will have the ability to move slightly, making costly repairs lessened. these ideas are not new of course, but only being rediscovered. they have used lime mortar in castles in eastern europe for centuries. and they are now using rubber shreds in concrete for roads in Maine and other northern states. the latest adventure has been done with the city of Chicago, which is trying out rubber shredded concrete in its' own city project !

But i would like to hear from the population on this website, have you ever thought about the ideas of using concrete or stone in a building ? what do you see as the advantages, and what are the disadvantages ? clearly, you have thought about this event, so now is a good time to express your ideas in response to this subject !

Thank You

Thor451