Translucent concrete
Concrete is the new plastic!
Gee, are we in a for a resurgence of 1970’s-style concrete buildings? That’s a retro-trend I could do without.
Yeah, but moving the stuff to vacuum is a real nut buster.................
Years ago I was impressed with concrete that could be poured under water... it’s come a long way.
But, but, but I thought concrete was evil because of the massive amount of “green house gases” given off in its manufacture?
Is “Feats of concrete” anything like “Feet of clay”?
The humble building material that gets me is “hydraulic cement”.
Developed by the Romans, then the secret of it’s making/use was
lost for centuries (or so The History Channel sez!).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pozzolana
Congressman Billybob
When I think of “Feats of Concrete” I think of what Hillary has in plans for her political enemies, should she win... ;0)
Sorry, concrete must be banned for the good of Mother Gaia. It emits CO2 when it cures.
Pycrete - Interesting stuff. They thought about making massive floating battleships out of it in WWII.
Pykrete is a super-ice, strengthened tremendously by mixing in wood pulp as it freezes. By freezing a slurry of 14 percent wood pulp, the mechanical strength of ice rockets up to a fairly consistent 70 kg/sq cm. A 7.69 mm rifle bullet, when fired into pure ice, will penetrate to a depth of about 36 cm. Fired into pykrete, it will penetrate less than half as far — about the same distance as a bullet fired into brickwork. Yet you can mold pykrete into blocks from the simplest materials and then plane it, just like wood. And it has tremendous crush resistance: a one-inch column of the stuff will support an automobile. Moreover, it takes much longer to melt than pure ice.
http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/7/floatingisland.php
bmflr
Self ping