Good Day!
I have no real experience with papercrete but I do have experience
with stucco and construction in general. Having perused the web I
have come to the conclusion that either most papercrete creations are
in dry climates or the people posting info are.
As well it seems that most papercrete building is 'new home'
construction rather than applying these techniques to existing
homes. With that said I am hoping that I am not alone in my desire
to find some good advice here on how to move forward with
incorporating papercrete into an existing home. My family and I live
in southern Alberta, Canada which is still many miles north of where
much of the papercrete work seems to be focused. With that said this
is my intention as of right now. We live in a thousand sqft home
with a basement of approximately similar dimensions. There is an
exisitng concrete basement that is eight feet deep. This basement
does not have any insulation nor does it have a concrete floor. What
I intend to do is 'pour' a papercrete slab to approximately 4" depth,
run an in floor heating line above that and then top it off with clay
flooring. As for the walls I have a couple of possibilities in
mind. Due to the insulative nature of papercrete I could spray
progressive layers of high paper, papercrete directly onto the
exisitng concrete walls. Another technique I am thinking about using
is 'harling' the mixture on the wall until I have the desired
thickness. These 2 techniques have the advantage of trapping air in
the mixture as it is being applied therefore adding to the insulting
effect. The other method would be to simply trowel the mixture on in
a couple of brown coats until the right thickness is achieved. My
questions are simple ones, firstly anyone try this before? Two, how
does papercrete bond to existing concrete? I know with stucco
spalling can occur so for that reason I usually add some Elmer's glue
and extra lime, very sticky and haven't lost a parging yet. Mikey
Sklar has suggested a couple of cups of old latex paint. The most
pressing question is to what thickness can one go when attaching
papercrete to existing concrete? My concern here is the papercrete
not having the necesary structral integrity to support its own weight
and will then come off in chunks. A few ideas have been to attach
chicken wire to the concrete much as you would in applying stucco to
a wall. Or perhaps run nails into the wall and then weave willow
branches through them to form a kind of rebar structure. We are
motivated by trying to use all locally available resources.
Ultimately I think I am going to try them all and see which works.
If can prove an effective method for binding papercrete to concrete I
can then add this to my available options for my customers who are
looking for more'green' building techniques. Next time I will
describe how I intend to turn an old hot tub into a papercrete
mixer. Thanks for any input you may have.
James
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