Here are two pictures of the new addition project for our house. Nathan is using a method called "rammed earth" for building our new guest room/tutor room. He's been reading about how to do it effectively, testing the dirt, building his forms and laying the foundation over the past month...and now the "ramming" part of the construction is underway. While Nathan was pouring the foundation, he had workers breaking rocks, washing rocks, carrying water from the river, mixing cement, pouring cement...etc. There were LOTS of people around taking advantage of having a job for a day. We have it whittled down to just a few workers a day now, it seems more efficient that way and MORE actually gets done with fewer workers. Here's the quote of the week from the crew chief (Nathan), "I see alot of people looking at each other but I don't see people working!" 
In the first picture, the guys are setting up the form. In the second picture Nathan is pouring a mixture of 50-60% dirt to 40-50% sand and one of our Bantu neighbors is using a really heavy ramming bar to pack the mixture into the form. Next, they'll remove the form and place it somewhere else and pack some more dirt. So far, the guys are excited about it and I've heard the comment from a young Baka fellow, "this is how I'm going to make MY house".
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2 comments:
Cool. I'm assuming you used the cement for footers and are putting the rammed earth on top for walls. What do you use to seal the outside walls from rain? Does the soil have clay in it? Is there a timeframe needed for a wall to dry before another section is rammed on top of it? Would it help to have a rod of some sort sticking into the footer and running up through the rammed walls every several feet or so I wonder? We're praying all goes well... when do you expect to complete it?
Too bad Eddie isn't there. He worked in concrete for awhile and would be able to help out!
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