LOL
I can't count the times I've had to eat a similar pie, but relax. No
need to dine on that pie, Duane. In fact, I hope you'll continue in
your efforts. Whether any one particular person agrees with you or
not isn't the point.
Just because you and I disagreed on a papercrete related issue, it
clearly didn't justify banning (as you joked about), or any
disiplinary action. Your previous post was certainly papercrete
related and very respectful. You eloquently stated your opinion at
that time, based upon what experiments you had conducted to that
point. You stated your case well.
At one time when I was first learning about papercrete, I had
proposed similar prelimiary theories. Thankfully I kept testing and
came to different conclusions. I very much appreciate your desire to
prove for yourself what works and what doesn't.
That's the whole purpose of this group, to share information and
promote mutual learning (and have fun). Your post resulted in a very
interesting discussion about borax and boric acid. Your perspective
about how those materials work was a dimension I hadn't considered
before. I learned a lot from several links about borax and boric
acid that got posted. Cutting you off would have prevented me from
learning that. I would have been a big loser if I had missed that
exchange.
No one should hesitate to disagree with me or anyone else about
papercrete if they have cause to do so. If you think someone is
wrong, say so. Just make certain that you disagree with specific
statements and don't attack someone personally. Anyone's personal
attack WILL incur the wrath of the moderators. Of course, if I think
I'm correct, don't be surprised if I post and explain my thinking and
pull out all the supporting evidence I can muster to backup my
stance. It's all about getting the best information out there for
everyone to see. Members can decide for themselves what they choose
to believe.
About your experiment. Thanks for posting about it.
My hope is to go through a similar process with hundreds of slightly
different mix ratios and conduct a comprehensive battery of tests.
I'd like emperically define a set of equations that can accurately
predict various behaviours of papercrete mixes. Defining papercrete
in this way should make it easy for architects and engineers to
design structures out of papercrete and have consistently predictable
results. IMHO this will be a giant leap toward getting papercrete
adopted by the IBC.
Such do-it-yourself experiments won't have official certification,
but all the guesswork will be done. An official testing lab will
only need to confirm the previous results. Many the sidetracks and
dead-ends will have been eliminated.
It's the experiments that don't work as expected that we learn the
most from. The ones go as we expect just confirm what we thought.
No experiment is a failure if we learn from it.
Keep up the great work, Duane. I'm loving it!
--- In papercreters@yahoogroups.com, "mdumiller" <mdmiller1@...>
wrote:
>
> I've eaten humble pie before and this email is to support
slurryguy's
> claim of fire resistance of papercrete (if you do it
right). ....and
> to say I'm sorry for jumping to conclusions.
>
> All of my previous testing showed that papercrete would not burn,
BUT
> my concern was after-glow, the charcoal briquet effect. Even with
a
> lot of minerals added to PC, there would be after-glow, with the
> papercrete sample ultimately consummed as it smoldered, over time.
> Sometimes it took awhile, but there was always a slow glow.
>
> In my first test samples with borax and boric acid added, there was
> still "glow". But, as I describe below, the glow can be controlled
> completely with borax/boric acid (if you do it right). Actually,
the
> borax doesn't help stop glow, since it is a flame suppressant, and
> not for suppressing glow. The PC samples don't "flame" when they
> burn anyway, and in my opinion borax not necessary in PC for fire
> proofing. But borax is good for fungus and critter control.
>
> In the link below, I exposed the PC sample to the 2000F. blue tip
of
> a propane torch for a minute. You could say that's pretty
drastic.
> And you're right. But it worked.
>
> This proof of concept is important for the code portion of this
work,
> since PC can't be used in a many construction situations if there
is
> no simple (cheap) way to totally fireproof it. What seems crucial
in
> my evaluation is pre-dissolving the boric acid separately in a
small
> amount of water, squeezing water from the paper slurry, and adding
> the dissolved boric acid back into the paper, thus recreating the
> slurry with a strong dose of boric acid. The slurry with the boric
> acid mix added back in was still very thick, I didn't want to lose
> the boric acid mix in water dripping out of the final mix.
>
> See for yourself.
> http://www.domovitae.com/fcrete/pcfire2.htm
>
> Thanks slurryguy for not banning me from the group. - Duane
>
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