Papercreters: [papercreters] Re: Recipe Ratios

Thursday, June 25, 2009

[papercreters] Re: Recipe Ratios

I don't have any desire to speculate about the ingredients in Mason Greenstar's mix. There are plenty of papercrete recipes that have been around for years and decades before they came along that work very well.

As far as how they get a lightweight block with what might appear to be a dense mix, it doesn't appear magical to me at all. Don't their blocks have holes in them? Similar to traditional concrete block or cinder block? That would dramatically change things compared to a typical solid block that most papercreters make.

--- In papercreters@yahoogroups.com, "Bob" <criswells.ok@...> wrote:
>
>
> I just downloaded Masongreenstar quote from his patent #20090065978
>
> "This building material composition in an uncured state is made up of
> between about:
>
> * 70 and 74% by weight water;
> * Between about 7 and 8% by weight shredded paper;
> * Between about 18 and 20% by weight cement; and,
> * Between about 0.1 and 0.4% by weight cement conditioning
> admixtures.
>
> lets convert these %'s to lbs:
>
>
> * 74 lbs water (at approx 8lbs per gallon that would be about 9.25
> gallons, not a whole lot of water)
> * 8 lbs shredded paper (dry weight not much compared to the cement
> content)
> * 20 lbs dry cement (I believe dry cement weighs about 5 lbs per
> gallon, that would be 4 gallons, that is an awful lot, really a lot if
> dry cement weighs more than 5lbs per gallon)
> * 4 lbs other conditioning admixtures (way to much information for me
> to understand and too much added cost as well, I would just add clay or
> sand here)
>
> I can't see where his 10 inch by 14 inch by 4 inch blocks could only
> weigh 8.5 lbs. I don't know for sure but I believe the above mixture
> would fit into my 9.5"hx12"wx16"l form and would compress down to about
> 6x12x16 and it would weigh 32 lbs once the water is pressed out. I got
> that 32 lb figure by adding the 8lbs paper, 20 lbs cement and 4 lbs
> other. What are your thoughts on this?
>
> In my other post where I was referring to 2 gallons of slightly wet
> paper pulp, I will have to weight the dry paper that got pulped to see
> excatly how much dry weight I was referring to. I did not weigh the dry
> paper first I only dipped it out of the pulping container (draining it
> through my fingers) and dropped it into a gallon container twice, and
> then into my mixing bucket.
>
> Thanks for the info.
>
> Bob
>
>
> --- In papercreters@yahoogroups.com, "slurryguy" <slurryguy@> wrote:
>
> No worries Bob.
>
> The point I'm trying to make is that the recipe you listed in post #7826
> is nowhere close to the recipe you just listed from post 7146.
>
> The most important reason that they are drastically different is that
> you were quoting VOLUME measurements in gallons for your ingredients.
> The message you referenced listing ingredients by DRY WEIGHT.
>
> That completely changes everything. Your version, using gallons, if the
> paper were dry weight might only have (I'm taking a wild guess) one
> pound of paper per every 10 pounds of cement if those volume quantities
> measurements were weighed after getting dried out. Perhaps more extreme
> than that. You did report that your initial blocks were extremely heavy.
> Clair's message you quoted used a ratio of 1 to 1.5 paper to cement IN
> DRY WEIGHT.
>
> I simply want to make it clear so that everyone can understand exactly
> what you are doing and how it compares so that we all can learn from
> your experiences.
>
> If your intent, Bob, is to make a lighter weight block, I think you have
> an excellent idea to use more paper for the quantity of cement you are
> using.
>
> Don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to be difficult or start an argument.
> I'm just trying to make the comparison Apples to Apples.
>
> I hope my comments help some readers better understand the differences
> in the recipes being used.
>