From experience I know that papercrete, when dry can be very light-- its all dependant on
the mix. However, a friend of mine who's a technical sort of guy with an engineering
background can't wrap his head around that fact unless he crunches the numbers. His
concern is as follows, and I'm wondering if someone could suggest some facts and numbers
to help ease the minds of technically oriented engineering majors? He said to me, "look at
the density of tissue paper as approximately 0.01lbs per cubic inch.... well,12 inch x 12 inch
x 12inch = 1728cubic inches or 1 cubic foot.... so, one cubic foot of tissue paper weighs
17.28lbs. I just want to know how you add portland and sand to the papercrete and end up
with less than 6lbs/cubic foot (less weight per cubic foot than tissue paper)?... bear in mind,
iron wieghs about 550lb/cubic foot!"
I understand that there's a lot of water weight that evaporates, and that a lot of air is trapped
in the final product. Also, I don't know if his weight for a cubic foot of tissue paper is for
loosely stacked sheets or a tightly compacted, baled block of paper. What it comes down to is
that my friend is skeptical about roof load if I build a papercrete dome, and thinks I'll either
need a massive framework, or sound engineering that he can understand and contemplate
before he commits to helping me on the job site. The best thing would be to hand him a one
cubic foot block of papercrete and a scale and let it go at that, I suppose.
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