Bamboo Cement

Driving home from the construction site today I saw a group of Thai builders using Bamboo as reinforcement in a concrete floor and also a driveway and stopped and took these photographs.

Whilst I am always interested in alternative and traditional building techniques and practices and the use of bamboo as a reinforcing material in concrete construction is rather well documented – I was rather surprised by just where this technique was being used, the brand new shop fronts where very  “modern” and although perhaps I have grown too cynical in recent months about the standard of building and builders in SE Asia I could not help but feel the only reason that this was being done was to cut a few dollars from the build with the hope that it will hold together long enough that they are long gone before any number of potential problems arise, one of the reasons that I just could not buy a “finished house” here in SE Asia.

I was also unimpressed by the lack of “aggregate” in the mix, just glad its not my house !

For those interested in 1966 US Naval Engineers Francis Brink and Paul Rush wrote a report about the potential application of Bamboo Reinforced Concrete.

The report was originally intended to assist field personnel in the design and construction of bamboo reinforced concrete and includes comments on the selection and preparation of bamboo culms for reinforcement, construction principles of bamboo reinforced concrete, and design procedures it even and includes several structural charts and conversion criteria for translating from steel reinforced concrete design.

The Brink Rush Report on Bamboo Reinforced Concrete Construction is here.

[Show as slideshow]

Be Sociable, Share!

•