17 votes

Making wood ash cement and building a fired brick hut

6 comments

  1. [3]
    0d_billie
    Link
    I always enjoy watching these videos, they're incredibly relaxing. This particular build was very impressive, and honestly from the appearance of the hut I would say "primitive" isn't the most...

    I always enjoy watching these videos, they're incredibly relaxing. This particular build was very impressive, and honestly from the appearance of the hut I would say "primitive" isn't the most accurate adjective!

    3 votes
    1. vektor
      Link Parent
      The "primitve" part of it mostly refers to the fact that all he brings into the forest is his pants probably some food and drinking water his camera All his tools and materials are sourced from...

      The "primitve" part of it mostly refers to the fact that all he brings into the forest is

      • his pants
      • probably some food and drinking water
      • his camera

      All his tools and materials are sourced from the wilderness.

      One day I'm sure he'll make his own pair of pants from plant fiber.

      1 vote
    2. cfabbro
      Link Parent
      Yeah, he's basically progressed from utilizing mostly stone-age technology to Roman technology now. :P Although apparently there is evidence of fired clay bricks being created in central China as...

      Yeah, he's basically progressed from utilizing mostly stone-age technology to Roman technology now. :P

      Although apparently there is evidence of fired clay bricks being created in central China as far back as the middle neolithic era. So despite the hut's architecture being relatively modern, it's still pretty "primitive" underlying technology, all things considered.

  2. cfabbro
    Link
    Obligatory: - Don't forget to turn on the closed captioning before watching the video - Link to his Patreon - Video description

    Obligatory:
    - Don't forget to turn on the closed captioning before watching the video
    - Link to his Patreon
    - Video description

    I built a hut from fired clay bricks and mortared them together with a cement made from wood ash left over from the firing process. When I developed wood ash cement years ago in a previous video, it was in response to the need of a cement made from material other than lime stone, which is absent in my location. Wood ash was suitable because it contains calcium oxide, the active cementitious material for making mortar. I made clay bricks and fired them in a kiln made previously. Then I collected the wood ash and made them into pellets storing them for later use. When it was time to make the mortar, I put the pellets in the kiln and fired them. Here it's important to note that the ash needs to be fired at a high temperature with oxygen, ordinary ash from a camp fire won't work as is because they don't get hot enough. It needs to be pelletized and fired again in a kiln before use. I mixed the fired ash pellets with sand (1:3 ratio by volume) and used it to mortar the bricks together. It's important to use a trowel (flat piece of wood here) instead of bare hands to handle the mortar due to lye burning the skin (I got mild lye burns on my fingers). The ash left over from firing the bricks was enough to mortar those same bricks together. The hut was 2x2 m and 2 m high at the gables. Wooden beams were placed onto the gables to form the roof and secured in place with mortar. Then I made barrel roof tiles and lay them onto these beams. The whole project took 6 and a half months to build. The hut sheds rain well and the mortar is water proof (won't dissolve in water), surviving many rainstorms even before the roof was up. The main take away from this video is to always look for a way to take a waste material (wood ash) and make it into a resource (cement).

    2 votes
  3. mat
    Link
    There was rumour a little while ago of John doing a TV show, but I'm not sure what - if anything - came of that. Feels like a very BBC Four kind of project. They've done that kind of thing before....

    There was rumour a little while ago of John doing a TV show, but I'm not sure what - if anything - came of that.

    Feels like a very BBC Four kind of project. They've done that kind of thing before. Them or NHK.

    2 votes
  4. JRandomHacker
    Link
    Primitive Technology has a certain something that the other channels in this vein don't quite have. He always makes me wish I had access to some land where I could go out and try stuff like that -...

    Primitive Technology has a certain something that the other channels in this vein don't quite have. He always makes me wish I had access to some land where I could go out and try stuff like that - but then I realize that I'm too sensitive to things like bugs and I'd just hate it. Guess I'll just watch vicariously from my nice chair in my house...

    1 vote