Papercreters: [papercreters] Re: Papercrete roof?

Saturday, September 12, 2009

[papercreters] Re: Papercrete roof?

Good question. I am gathering info too to build a flat roof home, and the roof must be (mostly) usable as a terrace. I do not gather that only papercrete will be strong enough on it's own - but rather will have to make a sandwich of first pour of (rebar) reinforced concrete, then papercrete, and another layer of concrete. Indeed sounds like a lot of effort and not sure if it's worth the effort.

I did some remodeling work on my current house 5 years ago (before I knew about papercrete) and made a poured concrete flat roof, 125mm thick, this is also for rain water harvesting to a 5000 liter tank.

I put 12 regular glass blocks into this roof, spacing between each is about 2 meters, these provide good daylighting with very little heat gain. Two of these glass blocks leaked a bit for awhile, but interesting was they grew "stalactites" and stopped leaking. I even put 1/2" PVC pipes (36 meters long total) into the roof for a double function, warm the water and cool the roof. It does work - makes the water a bit warmer for bathing - but I am not sure how much it sheds the heat from the roof. This area for sure though is the coolest part of the house.

I live in the rainy tropics, just south of Singapore. The main direction of my designs is getting double (or triple) function, and in sync with the tropical temps, wind, and rain fall. Rain fall has been going up in the last years - just yesterday it rained big time and this filled my (near empty) tank and was overflowing.

In any event I'll be using papercrete where possible, and if it looks like on the roof for a terrace is not a good idea - please do run some comments here, - glad to trade any insights / ideas.

Cheers to All.
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--- In papercreters@yahoogroups.com, "thelandyachtaustin" <thelandyacht@...> wrote:
>
> If properly sealed, can papercrete be used on a "flat" roof? (Flat meaning no more that 5 degrees of tilt).
>
> And if so, what's the consensus on the recommended sealant, something like this?
> http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1vZ1xh6/R-100653826/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053
>
> Have begun planning for a house, and have decided to go the shipping-container route for the main structure, with a (probably 12") sheath all around (and on the roof too if the answer to the above is yes) of papercrete.
>
> 12" will give me an insulation value around R36 if I've been reading right.
>
> Or am I just blowin smoke?
>