We plan to start building our own home soon and want to build with concrete blocks. We would like to find a book and/or website about using concrete or cement blocks for building. We haven't exactly figured out how to do the windows either.

Thanks for any help.

-- Shelbie D. (hsmomof3@ipa.net), November 24, 2000

Answers

My father built a large house of concrete blocks and that baby was warm in winter, draft free and solid during the worst storms. My suggestions are that you make sure you know where all piping, electric lines, and cables are going for sure. It is very hard to change your mind once everything is down in cement. Always make sure to leave some type of access to places that may need to be serviced in the future. It is not fun to have to drill through concrete to get to something that needs repaired.

Preplanning and more preplanning are essential. My father didn't use any books. He had a plan in his head, sketched it on paper and got a contractor.

-- R. (thor610@yahoo.com), November 25, 2000.

Interesting this should come up. I have a building that my dad built in the early 50's from block. He used it as a farm shop, I use it for that too but also do some woodworking. Would like to heat it. I've checked on new windows, the old ones are steel frame with one pane of glass and have been trying to decide how to insulate it. Any help would be great, thanks for posting this question.

-- Betsy K (betsyk@pathwaynet.com), November 25, 2000.

I live in a concrete block house and I would say that it probably is self insulating. Our house keeps a pretty even temp (although it can be a little chilly inside even if it's warm outside if the night was cold) and heating is pretty much easy to maintain, as the temp doesn't fluctuate as long as you have all of the holes plugged. I would advise replacing those single pane windows. They are essentially holes. If you really feel the need to insulate, simply place foam board insulation against the walls and cover them with panelling or dry wall. you should screw into the walls using mollys or the screws will eventually (or not so eventually) pull out of the wall under the weight of the wallboard/insulation. Make sure that your ceiling is well insulated, of course, and put down something comfy underfoot, although for a shop I would reccommend vinyl tile rather then carpet, of course. A cement floor will suck the warmth right out of you when you stand on it, and covering it will not hamper its thermal mass qualities. I would also reccommend a large southern window to help warm the place in winter and bring in light in summer. our place (we rent) has the dinkiest windows and it gets pretty gloomy in here sometimes. if you're building, I would suggest an in-floor radiant heating system as ideal for any earthen structure, as it takes the chill out of the floor and takes excellent advantage of the thermal mass qualities of this type of building.

-- Soni (thomkilroy@hotmail.com), November 25, 2000.

Even if you are good at building I would recommend having a contractor put in the slab, walls and roof. You can then do the inside yourself. May save you a lot of time and headaches as well. I am firmly convinced concrete blocks now weigh twice as much as when I was a teenager. Must be using a different mix.

-- Ken S. in WC TN (scharabo@aol.com), November 26, 2000.

That reminds me - I heard that in northern Europe (Switzerland or Sweden or somewhere like that) they use a lot of concrete block made from pumice, or volcanic stone. It's so light that it actually floats on water, but is as strong as regular block and more insulating, due to the air pockets. Might be worth checking out.

-- Soni (thomkilroy@hotmail.com), November 26, 2000.

As a kid we built a house out of blocks. It was sturdy and cheap as we used used blocks. There is a type of blocks that are lighter than others but in my experience they are not as strong. Insulating is the hard but there is insulation that you pour inside as you build. It was hard to seal the windows and doors. They are slow to build also.

-- Tom (Calfarm@msn.com), November 26, 2000.

Don't know a thing about building it, but I do know that honey ends up with alot of 'mis' measured windows at the company he works for- 1/4 inch can set entire job on it's ear! Buy the windows, doors, cabinets, tubs- at a major, major discount and build the house around them.

-- Kathy (catfish@bestweb.net), November 26, 2000.

My Family built a cement block building in a little town called Reserve, New Mexico in the late 40s making every one of those blocks by hand. When I say by hand, we mixed the mortar in a rocker which is a flat bath tub shaped container to hold water, lime, sand and cement. You mix it with a hoe, back and forth. Then pour this into a mold, let it set a certain length of time, tip it out carefully to cure and make another one. This building was huge, 2 story, 2 apartments to the rear and the U.S. Post Office on one side and a general store on the other side. We operated the general store for many years and rented out the other spaces. My Father built the building with help from an experienced brick layer. The building had nice large windows, power and water, wood heat and propane heat. The floors was again, poured cement. That area definately has seasons, one of them being winter, but I remember a small wood stove doing all the heat for the large area that was the General Store. So, I have lived in and worked in a building such as you are thinking to build, it is definately a possibility if you are not afraid of hard, heavy work. Good luck.

-- Maureen Stevenson (maureen@mtaonline.net), November 27, 2000.

Contrary to several views expressed here, concrete blocks have virtually no insulative value. If you live in a sunny climate, they will at least heat up in the day, and hold some heat through the night.

If they are filled with insulation, they have a bit of insulative value; I don't have the figures in front of me, though. I do know that virtually no one builds residential houses with them here (Oregon) anymore, as they won't pass code for insulation.

I have a house (earth sheltered downstairs), whose walls downstairs are split faced concrete blocks, filled with steel and concrete. I built another wall just inside the blocks out of two by four studs, with room for R-21 fiberglass insulation, plus a one inch air space between the fiberglass and the blocks, to keep moisture from the blocks out of the fiberglass. Works great. It also is a good way to avoid the hassle of running pipes and wires through the blocks.

R value for concrete and other forms of masonry is often misunderstood. Talk to an engineer, or a building inspector, or look on the net. Search for R value, or insulation. Or look i the library. Here's a sample of insulative R-values per inch from my builder's "bible" (I'm a semi retired contractor) Concrete block: 0.06 Brick: 0.11 Plywood: 1.25 Plastic (foam): 3.65 (this will vary some, depending on type) Fiberglass batts: 3.3

JOJ

-- jumpoffjoe (jumpoff@echoweb.net), November 27, 2000.

I should clarify here what I said above. When I said my father's house was warm in the winter, I did not mean to imply that the concrete blocks kept the house warm. My father insulated the house with regular pink insulation between the inside of the concrete blocks and the drywall. Being draft free was a great help in being able to heat the home. He said that this large house of blocks cost less to heat (oil heat) than the smaller wood frame house we lived in before (also oil heat).

-- R. (thor610@yahoo.com), November 29, 2000.

Hi, check into a type of passive solar slab (called a solar slab, I believe) it's not a slab poured of concrete but one of blocks with them on their sides and the holes allowing you to look all the way through them. The sun shines in the windows on your floor and heats the air inside the blocks which then rises and is used to heat the house somehow. A neighbor has a book on it, but I wasn't interested in a cement floor, but the theory looked good. Also check out surface bonding of the blocks instead of laying them up like bricks. The Roy's who have written all the recent cordwood books used concrete blocks laid side by side instead of end to end and surface bonding the face with mortar and it is supposed to be much stronger (This was for a buried part of a cordwood house). Good Luck!

-- JC (survivors00@hotmail.com), December 01, 2000.

We built our own house with block. It is one floor, no basement to clutter up! Every wall inside we studded up and put insulation in, we covered the walls with lumber or slate. Our bathroom is stone (right over the block. The house is 3/4 underground. All of our interior walls are white pine logs. Our house is over 3000 sq. feet. We heat it with a woodburner and it is always warm. The outside we covered with slate off of old barn roofs, it looks like big stone. We grouted between the slate with black ceramic tile grout. Everyone who sees our house is amazed. Including our outbuildins, well, excavating, anything we have bought down to the last screw we have less than $28,000 in the whole place and could probably do it cheaper now that we have learned a few things. It has been appraised at about 140,000. Think outside the box!

-- Melissa (cmnorris@1st.net), December 07, 2000.