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The Concrete Hollow Block House

Discussion in 'Introduce Yourself' started by HONEST DAVE, Dec 26, 2022.

  1. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    There is a way to use a cement mortar mix of 3 to 1 provided they use an additive which is called Tile Grip most hardware stores have this priced around P500 per bag, mixed with a one bag mix of cement you get the equivalent of 5.2 bags of tile adhesive so it works out at around 50% less in price, but there is more to tiling than just the adhesive, 1) did they have all the comb lines in the adhesive running in the same direction? 2) did they vacuum the area to be tiled? 3) did they wet the concrete floor immediately before tiling? likely you did not get even one out of three with No 2 never being done and perhaps they even soaked the tiles before laying which is a big No No.

    I would not consider that house in the Video to be small at 250M2 plus another 20% added on with the garage? in my view it is massively oversized? In the Philippine handbook of good building practise it recommends never to have parallel walls greater than 3.5mtrs apart, for obvious reasons smaller compact rooms have greater resistance to quakes, The big dumb open plan US design of the Living, Dining and Kitchen area all in one makes no sense to me and also the view of the contributors of this Philippine Handbook they were a mix of professional people from a mix of countries more advanced than US that have experienced natural disasters.
  2. Jim
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    Jim Well-Known Member Trusted Member

    My house don't need air-con for starters and for earth-quakes it has survived a 6.9 that ripped up the roads of Dumaguete. incidentally my house is 450 sm and not counting the balconies, house is cool as a cucumber even when tiny houses are getting sun baked. ;)
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  3. Heathen
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    Heathen Active Member

    I really like that Porch with a view but doubt it would have the same effect on a smaller lot, but with a bigger lot it looks really nice.
  4. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    Wow! Jim you have really taken the wind out of my sails, perhaps I am stupidly tarring everything with the same brush? I admit to never taking into consideration the ratio of Solar Heated CHB to the volume of air in the house, of course you are correct that in a small house likely there will be a higher ratio of SHCHB to the overall volume of air, in these larger structures such as yours this will be be a whole lot different with a lower ratio of SHCHB to volume of air, but Cool as a Cucumber does sound Too Good to be True now if you had said it was never greater or even slightly cooler than the outside ambient Temp that would sound more realistic to me? when there is Movement of air outside and you have a room with an opening at both ends you can induce the Tunnel effect and this will cool the place down, but in my experience, windy days and choppy seas are less common in PH than in UK? perhaps you have a little cooling secret tucked up your sleeve you are not telling us about or you live at a high elevation?

    Having lived in many rented houses in PH all of which were built in SHCHB some being 2 storey and others only single the latter were always the warmest, with the former having a staircase in the main living area creating a Chimney effect, sucking up the warm air to deposit it upstairs to the bedrooms, making them impossible to sleep in without AC, I used to tell my SO to put her arse in the fridge for 30mins to give me something cool to slip into when we went to bed, never did I live in any house over 100M2, but have known many who did, from what I recall most of them were apt to complain about the expense of running their AC, a good example of this is our Senbenjin the US guy who used to write a lot about house construction (he had built many) on that other Forum we are both members of, at one point he was telling us all he builds a form of suspended floor to stop some form of gas that is percolating into all of our dwelling and killing us off, I think this would have been Kryptonite? Anyway you may recall he was complaining about his electric bill rising from p11K a month up to 13K. I replied to this saying (Build an Insulated House)

    As it happens my neighbour in PH did build a SHCHB 85M2 house, what he did was to have this 1.5 storey with a kind of Atrium effect to the high section with windows up there that really sucked out the hot air, so his main living area had a 20ft high ceiling at the front with windows at both the high and low part and 12ft at the back, two of the three sides that were likely to get sun on them were completely shaded with only the top half of one gable getting a blast of the late afternoon sun, although it achieves what he set out to do it looked ugly, I also disliked the Echo in this room being much like a high sided cave, being hard of hearing this affects me, all large rooms have this problem to some degree some less than others if they have lots of soft furnishings.

    My fully Insulated house in PH is pretty dam good but not perfect, opening windows and doors during the day has it at the ambient temp and OK inside with a fan going, however when we go out early evening and close everything up to then come home later in the evening, the temp is just the same at 10pm as it was at 3pm, we have a hall right in the middle of the property and I sometimes wonder if I should have installed a 1HP AC in this to then run it for perhaps no more an hour? to take the temp down for this to stay this way for a long time after I'm quite sure that had my house been done in SHCHB, taking the Temp down using AC is only temporary as the Blocks will be giving off heat well into the night, this being my experience?
  5. Jim
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    Jim Well-Known Member Trusted Member

    I live near the sea about 150 meters.
    We have a double door we leave open and a single door at the back that creates airflow, plus the windows are left open. We have mossy screens on the doors and windows also security bars. Thats the ground floor. Next we have a stairs that goes to the third floor, and 3 sides are open apart from the firewall, that cools the whole building down.
    The second floor has a hallway and double door that leads to the balcony again it has bars and mossy screens, so that cools down the second floor.
    Okay, are still with me lol. then we have 3 large bedrooms with CR's the two at the front have sliding doors with mossy screens and bars and the one at the back just leave the CR window open, we leave them open during the day but close them at night, also the CR's have a windows that allows air flow.
    Now, we do have ceiling fans but not been on for months due to the inclement weather we are experiencing.
    Maybe cool as a cucumber is a figure of speech. :)

    Oh, and no air-conditioning. Hope this helps.
    Last edited: Feb 1, 2023
  6. Jim
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    Jim Well-Known Member Trusted Member

    I do like your insulated house in Valencia @HONEST DAVE. Maybe a little bigger.
  7. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    Thanks Jim fo your favourable comments,

    When I decided to go ahead with the building of a house for my Son and His Mum, my first consideration was to try and have it affordable and easily managed when I am gone, something she could stay in for the rest of her life, so AC had to be ruled out of the equation and this was behind the idea of having it insulated, in my experience at that time all the CHB houses that I had lived in required AC, however in my research on building in PH I come across article from a Chartered Surveyor who Lived and worked in Bali, he specialises in fixing up buildings that are in need of renovation, seemingly the build standards there resemble that in PH and all Fecked up, he has a Web Site (MR FIXIT BALI) He went on to talk about a serious earthquake they had there where many people had been killed, mostly caused by falling CHB walls, adding that in the same area there was hardly any problems where the people lived in the traditional Bamboo houses, they had the ability to bend with the wind and flex in a quake, this man was talking sense to me, so this turned me to the idea of using metal, the main Pillar and Beam structure of my house has been done in heavy gauge angle bar all welded together, this cost me a fortune twice as much as I had anticipated, the infill to this has been done in GI steel channel and then clad with Hardiflex. Btw Mr Fixit is an Englishman which come as a surprise? so there is a few good ones around Haha.

    This house in PH is 2bed, 2bath of 84M2 around 9m2 is taken up with the hall and stairwell, plus it has 4M2 of walk in Cupboards, the design is loosely based on my house back here in Scotland, which is the best most practical house I even lived in this being, a 4bed, 2Bath, well Insulated modern Bungalow, of 128m2 and has 15M2 used in the Hall, easily managed and easy to keep clean. I suppose I could have sold this, taken the money over to PH and build a house the size of a small Hotel and at one point I did think to do this, however I'm now glad I decided against this idea, my partner and our son spend 3/4hrs every day at the local Tennis court, she has the time on her hands to enable her to do this, all things considered she has a good life there, not having to spend that much time keeping her wee hoose ship shape.
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  8. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    A couple of things should be noted when buying a Lot and to then go on and build a house on it, there in Valencia where this house is, the land is mostly sloping and at an elevation of around 200mtrs above sea level, the Lot in the Video happens to be on the low side of the road, OK if there is a good drainage channel on that same side? but it is always better to get a Lot on the high side of the road, however the owner did get it at a knock down price, this has a market value of more than twice what he paid for it, he stole this.

    That Porch you mention just happens to face east so it will get some morning sun when it is cooler but the rest of the day it will be in shade, so this is just perfect, however the Car Garage although it looks good being integrated into the house all under the one roof, the vehicles within will be getting a lot of sun on them and the concrete slab will really heat up to radiate that heat well into the dark hours.

    Overall this house does look good and for the most part aesthetically pleasing, there is a really nice wood effect tile on the floor I know this as I have the exact same in my house there haha, actually it does get a lot of favourable comments from others, however that Kitchen I do not understand, around 50% or perhaps even more of the Kitchens I have viewed in other Foreigners houses, have dark stained or painted Brown swept head doors (something quite fashionable 30 plus years ago in UK) added to that they also have the obligatory dark Grey or even Black false granite worktops and Black resin (looks like plastic) sink often with a Black Tap, the sink and top always show streaks even when clean? then there is the obligatory highline cupboards that your average Pinay cannot reach likely there is feck all in them (these are becoming less common in the modern UK Kitchen design). Btw your average Pinay needs less than half the Kitchen accoutrements than that of a western woman most of which are just for show anyway as the family eats mostly take outs.

    A modern day Kitchen in UK often has plain or shaker style doors in light colours often farmhouse cream, real or wood effect worktops white ceramic sinks and where there is room no highline cupboards but likely an island unit, these I find are much more pleasing to the eye than anything we ever had in the past 40/50yrs, farmhouse style from 100yrs ago is the in thing.

    The house in that video has been occupied by the owners for just over a year, by this time that All Sustainable Solid Mahogany Kitchen will be starting to smell musty and the cockroaches will have taken residence in the base units, I'm sure the Termites will appreciate this wood being sustainable? in my experience most of the Kitchens there in PH have a musty smell, all of the ones I lived in had problems. I'm not sure if I found the complete solution to all of the above problems only time will tell?

    In my own Kitchen which is only base units, they are all built in steel C channel clad with Hardiflex, with each unit backing on to an external wall and each of these units are fitted with a screened vent to the outside, this worked out fairly cheap for me, not that this was planned for, spending less than P25K and this included a semi commercial double tub sink done in welded 2mm SS panels and not the thin pressed type, the units cover a length of 4.8mtrs one of which has 4 drawers.
    Last edited: Feb 1, 2023
  9. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    I never have approved of the CHB houses and often voiced my opinion of this, only this morning I was posting on another Foreigners Forum and this was on a thread pertaining to a choice of Roofing material, here is what I had to say on this.

    Many times I have seen houses for sale in PH and these being described as Western Style or even worse built to Western Standards this you will never get, all you can ever get is the Style but never the build standard even if they are done under a Foreigners control, these useless Pinoy construction workers will beat the Foreigner in the end. When western standard is the description this usually implies a large Feck off Texan style with everything being bigger and better from there? their standards would not meet the building codes of those in UK,

    However, when it comes to Roofs I would say any being done in a western style are unsuitable for any hot tropical climate, giving a good flow of air to the underside of the Roof sheets is a prime requirement for a Roof in this instance, at the very least some form of venting at ridge height is a must to allow the hot air to escape, even using GI steel sheets the temp can be greatly reduced in the attic if it is well vented, but for the hot air to rise out of these top vents an equal amount of air has to enter at a lower level otherwise the airflow would be restricted and perhaps not all that effective? consideration has to be given to wind resistance with large open vents, an example of this I could give here, many years ago both my neighbour and I had near identical Greenhouses, one night of very high winds and his was just a pile of glass, the wind had entered the open door and had blown much of the glass outwards some landing a few feet away, where mine was completely intact, he had left the door open to his and my one had the door closed, likely even if he had closed the door to his the outcome may have been just the same, I had doubled up the amount of retaining clips to each pane of glass, I had been advised by a Glazier that had my neighbour taken out a few sheets of glass at the opposite end to his door this would have saved it.

    It is widely accepted that the best design of Roof to withstand high winds is a Hipped Roof (the trusses done is steel with a tendency to have a little flex to them} a 30 degree slope is the optimum angle for this. Gabled Roofs (there is a lot of stress on the gable walls in high winds) and flat Roofs tends to be too rigid and these are the roofs most likely to blow off completely, a large high Roof is more likely to be damaged than a small low one, having looked at many Pics showing roofs suffering wind damage, often this damage is just a hole blown one one side of the Roof with a corresponding hole of the same size on the opposite side, it is rare for most roofs to be a complete write off as long as they are firmly fixed down to the walls of the house.

    When I designed and installed my own roof back there in PH I did not know all of the above, it was only after I had finished it that I realised it was one very large structure much like a tall ship this would beat any Tea Clipper on the open sea, partly from a Aesthetic view being very symmetrical and also an engineering practicality, my Hipped roof is 20x10mtrs a perfect rectangle with a rake of 45 degrees, this is very well vented and having uPVC Roof sheets I would suggest it to be as cool as it can get in the attic space, it turned out to be not all that practical to work on and fit the roof sheets, it required double the manhours to fit the roof sheets each worker had to be roped to another for safety, had it been done at 30 degrees it would have been safe to walk on and be less expensive.
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  10. John Surrey
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    John Surrey Well-Known Member

    Yo @HONEST DAVE
    Sadly the Bodega is on hold...

    But I have a LeanTo Extension roofing question you might be able to help me with if you're not too busy there:

    01 - LeanToSite.png 02 - ExistingHouseWall.jpg 03 - Lean To Plan.jpg 04 - BracketQuestion.jpg

    My question, the last picture, is what's the best way to join the steel roof trusses (I call them brackets) to the main house ?

    If I ask a "builder" to do it here... I'm pretty sure they'll knock holes in the three pillars you can see until they find a bit of rebar to weld the end of the trusses to and that'll be that. They'll weld it and fill in the holes. My main concern is the 3 separate trusses will end up wonky and when we try to put the purlins on and finish the roof it'll be a nightmare.

    So, what's the pro-way to go about it do you think?

    BTW I should point out the site isn't square - tapers from about 2.9M to 2.6M front door to back door so to speak :D
  11. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    The Pro-way I could not answer that? I can only give an opinion of how I would do it. it would be folly to try bolting the truss to the wall using expanding anchor bolts unless you were completely 110% sure the concrete was done to the highest standard? The Pinoy way is kind of half right, the Truss needs to be connected to the Rebar, however they would just dig out the concrete and weld the end of the new slightly rusted angle bar to the very rusty old Rebar using a stick welder which leaves something resembling blobs of chewing gum (most of the welding I have observed in PH is like this and even to get a good weld on new Rebar is difficult) after this weld has cooled a tap with a hammer would break the joint. Every man and his Dog knows that to join any two materials together with adhesive both surfaces must be clean (Pinoys do not understand this) this same rule applies to the joining of metal together whether by soldering or welding.

    The only way to get a good weld from Angle to Rebar would be to grind a flat on the bar and take the ridges off this, which is cleaning the metal at the same time, the angle bar should also be ground clean at the point of the weld, however you still end up with a non skilled Pinoy doing the final weld?

    There is a way to have this Pinoy welding to near Pro level no matter how much of a Cupid Stunt he is, even a 10yr old can use the method with success. Use a Flux Cored Mig Welder, these are unbelievably easy to use 20mins practise with this and anyone can do a good strong weld.
    A Stick Welder is around P3000 to buy new, the Mig can be had for P5000 new, I bought mine for my house build which was all done in steel and put 70kgms of welding wire through our P5K Mig which was bought On-line and of the Lotus brand (the big hardware stores charge 11K for them) and then sold it on for half the price I paid for it, I guess this has some savings in labour time over the use of the stick?

    If I was to be doing this job for myself likely the extension would end up square at the front if possible and the back wall to maintain the existing angle, in order to do this the three trusses would be different in length, so I would do the longest first and use this as a template for the other two these being shorter and reducing at the back not the front, however it would be ideal to have some form of final adjustment to these as you will not know if the Rebar is all the same depth into the wall, so the best way to attach to the RB is to have short pieces of 1.5inch flat bar 2mm thick and loop this around the RB leaving a couple of 2inch tails to be welded to the angle bar on both sides, to get everything straight true and level attach a temp support of wood strapping pinned to the wall and the three trusses can sit on these and be adjusted to level using shims, once all is welded and the wall filled and cured the supports are removed.

    For a 3mtr long Pratt Truss as yours are, 2inch angle is far more than required, I did trusses of the same and similar length using 1inch angle of 2mm thickness and the bracing done with 10m Rebar, Ok this was only for an animal shed, if I were to do this to a small house extension, I would be using 1.5inch angle of 2mm thick and 1inch angle x 2mm for the bracing, they may flex a little side to side but none from top to bottom, if you have not handled them before the Top hat roof purling's to attach the roof sheets to are very strong and take all the sideways flexing out of the truss.

    The Lotus and Tolsen brand of tools has served me well, Cheers John
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  12. John Surrey
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    John Surrey Well-Known Member

    Thanks Dave I'll do another pic tomorrow to check my understanding of the looping bit.
  13. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    Today I posted this on another Ex-Pat site I am a member of and I thought it may be of interest here?

    The other day I had an Ex-pat ask me, if there was a Builder I could recommend, in the DGTE area, to this I replied that I only know one and it turns out he is very busy at this time.
    This guy went on to say his Wife has a close relative who is a Mason sounds more like Massoon the way they say it, (this being a very loose term used in PH for a man that has stacked CHB's using mostly spent mortar to bind them together to thus form a wall) she goes on to say that he is very well good in building, and now he is now getting a little pressure applied from family members to start him as the relative is not working at this time. When I heard this I sussed that likely this man is not all that special or he would be in work?

    In my reply to this I told him it is fairly easy to find out just how good this man really is; all you need to do is ask a few questions pertaining to his trade.
    Having built a house there myself I soon found out these construction workers know so very little about their trade.

    The very first question would be is to ask what makes Cement go hard, I tried this out on many of them and in every case their answer was; It goes hard when the water dries out it, then you ask how long can you work with it after it has been mixed, they will then say you can keep working with it by just adding extra water to stop it drying out.

    The correct answer to the above is: the hardening of Cement is caused by a Chemical reaction once water has been introduced to it and the working time of it there in PH is around 15 to 25mins at best depending on the heat of the day? adding extra water does not stop or retard the process, In UK when it needs to be worked for longer such as in rendering, retarders can be added to extend the working life, these are just not available there in PH to my knowledge even when there is a definite need for them.

    With the all the above in mind, in my view the building of a CHB house is a complete failure from start to finish, perhaps more than 50% of the Mortars and Concrete used within them has set before it is placed.

    Further questions could be asked such as how do you find the perfect 90 degree angle using the 3,4,5, rule, or how to check if a square or rectangle is perfect by measuring from corner to corner, even the Glazing surveyor that was measuring up my house for the new windows did not know this, this sounds too dumb to be true but I assure you this actually happened.
    Last edited: Jul 26, 2023
  14. John Surrey
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    John Surrey Well-Known Member

    Thank you Dave - There's always a few exceptions but like you say - all the good ones are normally working already.

    I've found this book: Residential and Design Construction Guidelines to be to be quite informative.

    Sadly most construction workers here cannot read or understand English properly or do the basic math to enable them to work for themselves successfully... so they're very limited in what they can do. They're actually a bit like robots - they can do the single job the "engineer" gives them the precise instructions to do but beyond that the eyes start to glaze over... and they need to be re-programmed for the next task
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2023
  15. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    The Romans invented concrete a couple of thousand years ago and your description is correct it's a chemical reaction.

    And Pythagoras well yeah, primary school arithmetic.

    You have scared me enough that I will never hire local builders.
  16. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    So, if you would not hire local builders I can only assume you would be looking for a contractor who is a Foreigner? I know of 4 Foreigners who build houses in the area I lived back there in PH, only one of the 4 I have any respect for the other 3 are just charlatans in my view.

    No matter who the builder is or what country he is from they are all faced with the same problem and as John suggests, the construction workers available to them have limited ability, these workers need 100% supervision, I found I could hardly leave my site to go for a haircut and not come back to a problem they managed to create. Having built a Smart fully insulated Home in steel and Hardieflex I only needed a small working team which must have averaged around 2.5 men per day, my neighbour a Danish Guy who was building in CHB had around 10 in his team thus he had 4 times the amount of problems I was having, eventually this caused a complete collapse of his mental state, he has built one complete house but this is falling apart at the seams and another of the same but only half done, he lived there for one year and now the completed house has no one living there this past 18 months, the final nail in his coffin had been a retaining wall collapsed, this cost him P580K to put right.
  17. John Surrey
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    John Surrey Well-Known Member

    As you're around @HONEST DAVE One thing I cannot get my head around is the order of flooring and plinth beam...

    Why put in a plinth beam at floor level and then add the floor later - On a simple structure (thinking of my extension) wouldn't it be easier to do away with the plinth beam and just chuck down a reinforced slab over the foundations and the base of the whole building ?

    They generally don't bother with the plinth beam here but it seems like the last job is the flooring - perhaps that's it, chuck down a couple of inches of flooring with minimum amount of rebar and save some money.
  18. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    In the case of your extension all you would require is a decent well made 4inch slab more or less on grade but with 4inches of compacted gravel under it, this acts as a capillary break, to then go on to build a light framework of steel studs which is then clad with Hardieflex 9mm to both sides, this will give you what you require and can be done in 25% of the time it takes to do the same in CHB above a strip foundation.

    I may be able to answer your question at least in part about the Plynth Beam, the strongest part of any Pillar and Beam structure has to be the Pillars these being subject to the most sheer, both should be done in concrete of the same grade at 4500PSI= to a 1,2,3 mix ratio, however the amount of steel present in the Pillar 140kg per M3 is higher than that of the Beam which is around 120kg per M3, now a floor slab only needs to be around 2500PSI and contain 70kg of steel per M3, the main stresses that a Pillar is subject to is at both ends (the middle is subject to very little) and this is where you want Beams and I can only guess there is some reason to have the skeleton of the structure done in full before floors are done, however it is not done this way in the case of a second floor, when they do this, they cast the Floor plus the ring Beam all at the same time.

    I did open the link you posted, this was very much the same as the Philippines handbook of good building practice, both giving great information, I liked what it said about Natural Disasters, that they don't generally Kill People, when there is a Death this is caused by poor quality house fabrication, one thing does surprise me in them and that is, both advocate the use of CHB's in the stem wall with the steel members passing through them, in my view stem walls should be done in concrete where the steel is fully protected from any ground moisture and these walls to be 20cm above grade, the same goes for a Septic these should only be done in concrete with a water proofer added or high grade plastic, I know of two that had failed one in 12yrs and the other lasted 15 the one that lasted longest had the 6inch CHB's.
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  19. John Surrey
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    John Surrey Well-Known Member

    I was thinking I might go down the light steel with Hardiflex route once I'd completed the foundations but I'm very concerned it might buckle with the very strong winds we sometimes get here during Typhoon season...

    Do you not use any rcc columns above the slab - is it all done with light steel - roof too ?
  20. HONEST DAVE
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    HONEST DAVE Active Member

    OK John, I see you have concerns with this method of build and its ability to withstand high winds and you mention to have a foundation? when all that is required is a 4inch slab on grade, for your peace of mind this can be upgraded to have a Plynth Beam installed done at the same time as the slab is laid, 20cm should be adequate, 2 rebars of 16mm tied together like a ladder would give a strong fixing for wall anchors L shaped rods with a thread on one end are available there.

    When I speak of GI steel studs I am not talking about the type supplied there for this purpose, what is available there is very flimsy 3''x2''around 0.6mm in thickness and only good for interior walls and just not fit to be used on exterior walls. Myself and a German friend put our heads together and we managed to adapt a 4''x2'' GI steel C channel of 1.2mm in thickness and this really beefs things up, uprights were placed at 16'' centres and once the Hardieflex cladding is attached this is very strong with the ability to withstand a super Typhoon, my roofs trusses were done in welded angle iron, but if I had to do this again they would be done using this same GI channel.

    When you think on it a Scotsman and a German putting their heads together, it does not get any better than this, this should be all the assurance you require I would be very disappointed if you were to think otherwise?
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