Red clay masonry works

Building work consist of numbers of major work component. Four(4)  major components of building work are Structure work, Architectural Work, Mechanical Work and Electrical Work.

In this article we will discuss on building the building wall which is another small component of work which fall under Architectural work. Building Wall can be describe as External wall and Internal wall. Both of this wall can be build using various building material. Among the material used is Red clay brick. Building wall that was constructed with Red Clay brick, commonly known as common brick is a type of wall that being design not to carry any loading apart of its own weight.

What is common brick? Definition of common brick is " acceptable burned clay brick for the purpose of general usage of brickwork with no special claim for attractive value". Walls built with common brick required rendering or plastering for a fine finishing prior to any painting work or introducing of wall paper. Wall that required tiling as it finish surface usually required plastering to ensure that the built wall have a flushing surface in order to properly fixed the tiles.

*Standard size for masonry or Red clay Brick according to BS: 3921: 1985 or MS 7.6 : 1972 are as follows;

Length = 215 + 3 mm

Width  = 102.5 + 1.875 mm

Height = 65 + 1.875 mm

(* quoted from http://www.claybricks.com/more_info/brick-specifications.html )

In building a brick wall for any building we often heard of this terminology.

1. Half brick thick wall

2. One brick thick wall

3. One and a half brick thick wall.

All of those terminology is base on the measurement or the length of a standard brick. 

- Half brick thick wall = 1/2 x length of the brick,

- One brick thick wall = 1 x length of brick 

- One and a half brick thick wall = 1 length + 1/2 x brick length. 

Apart form the thickness of the wall another important part of the brick wall construction is the bond type between the brick. This bonding is to provide integrity between each of single piece of Red clay brick. Some of the type of bond are;

1. Stretcher Bond.

2. English bond

The application of those type of bond can be seen base on the wall thickness requirement. 

Half brick thick wall : stretcher bond

One brick thick wall : English bond

One and half brick thick wall : English bond and Stretcher bond.

Setting out for building wall construction.

Building wall construction required bricklayer to do a simple setting Out. How to do this setting out?

Below are steps that needed.

1. Study the Architectural construction drawing.

2. Do the measurement as specified on the drawing and mark every single point  (Both Upper and Lower Point).

3. On the lower ground Mark Continuous line from one end (earlier mark done at step 2) of the proposed wall to the other end of Proposed wall (earlier mark done at step 2).

4. By using Plumbob, Hang two (2) vertical tread for each end of the proposed wall. Make sure the tip of plumbob hang straight on top of the lower mark which is on the ground floor or lower floor where the proposed wall going to be build.

5. Tie a horizontal tread on both vertical tread. make sure that this horizontal tread is moveable and not too loose until it cannot stay on position when it is moved up and down to a new desire possition along the vertical tread.

4. Start lay your wall when all of this guide line/tread is fixed and practically working.

The tread is useful to ensure that the wall is build with a vertically Straight and horizontally straight unless the wall is designed to certain pattern.

When doing Setting out for a wall you will need this basic hand tool and consumable Material

a) Hammer 

b) Tread

c) Measuring Tape

4) Maker ( Pencil / Pen )

5) Nail

6) Chalk liner

 7) Plumbob.

Safety and Health Costing in Construction

Safety and health is an important field by itself. The term safety and health do not only applied for certain industry but in everyday task that we undertook. Safety and health issue need and have to be emphasised even if we are at home.

May be we do come across in our construction contract especially in our bill of quantity there is no specific item that mentioned on safety and health. However sometimes it is clearly spell  out in our general condition of contract or standard condition of contract that we need to provide safety and health precaution or equipment for the whole duration of the contract. Hence we are also required to fulfilled this term and condition of the contract once we signed and agreed to undertake the project. Even though it is not spell out in the bill of quantity we still need to allow some cost to cover this area.

Another clause that will always relate back to this safety and health issue is, we are required to adhere to all statutory and regulatory requirement and also local authority requirement. This statement seems to be very general but it might have the same impact as the item listed under our bill of quantity and contract drawing. Let say local authority required us to do protective measure to public safety and health when we are working within their jurisdiction, hence we need to comply to that requirement. However this does not appear as an item inside the bill of quantity. Hence, how are we going to cope with this cost?.What we can do is either to insert it elsewhere inside any item inside the bill of quantity or sometime there is always an item that is spell out as ..." Others:........." which I believe this can be use to insert the cost for Safety and Health.

Let we take a glimpse of how much could this safety and health could cost us. For example we had been awarded a construction project of worth of $30 Million ( Thirty million) with the construction duration of 12 months. According to our Board of construction Industry, all project that cost $20 million and above, a Safety and Health Officer must be appointed. Therefore we need to fulfil this requirement. Hence part of the cost in safety and health is the Safety and health Officer salary. By ordinary man terms, Salary is inclusive of any benefit that must be provided for an employee.In total how much will be the salary. let assume that salary for a Safety and health officer is $7000 per month inclusive of all benefit that he is entitle for under the law. Hence in total, salary alone will cost $84,000.00. how about other safety equipment that we need to provide. The most basic is Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). How about others equipments or signages that we need to install or erect throughout the construction period? In the end, the safety and health will cost us more than $84,000.00.

Why do we need to allow the safety and health cost inside our construction cost? By doing so our construction cost that we going to offer will not going to be competitive. Lets ask back to ourselves. If  I do not allow any cost for this and incident or accident at work place happened, where will I find the money to cover the damages cost? The second question is how about, if the accident happened to myself due to my own negligence for taking lightly the issue of safety and health, will i be able to continue with my work? let we keep the answer closed to out heart. Safety and health is not about making money but it is about our very own daily survivor. Therefore be careful of this safety and health at work place issue. It can happen to any of us.

If it still occurred at our construction site and we already take all necessary action that deem practical and fit to our working environment, than we have to accept is as our fate. But the rules is always about who's fault is it?. Do not let the expert telling us it is our fault and we are liable for this negligence.

Each country or state have their own set of rules that we need to adhere with. Hence for our own good, comply to it.

The photo is not belong to Construction2u.blogspot.com. It can be find and view at from http://www.documentingreality.com/forum/f10/fatal-work-accidents-25565

Construction and OpenOfice Free software.

Today reality, everyone are keen to keep the cost as minimum as it can be. The idea by doing so is, increasing profit from their operation. What does this mean to us as person involve in construction? It simply meant that if I can reduce my cost in delivering my contract successfully, I will be competitive enough to secure more project. As a result, there will be increase in Income. However in construction it is not only about the efficiency in physical construction but also the indirect supporting tools that we use.

Why OpenOffice? OpenOffice is an computer software which functioning as Microsoft office product. It have different type of software such as OpenOffice Calc which do the similar work like excel, OpenOffice writer can serve the purpose of the MS word and OpenOffice impress can do the same presentation like MS Powerpoint.

What so special about Openoffice? Its free to download and use. With this condition, we don't have to spend much money to purchase the software.

Wait. However there is some limitation in using this OpenOffice. You might facing problem with those who does not use OpenOffice especially if you want to share or distribute digital soft-copy of your works. before you share you works save the file as excel file to enable those that are using MS excel be able to open the file and edit it if necessary.

Best of all to those construction that want to minimized the cost on the the computer aided software. It might not be significant. but the bottom line is cost saving.(if possible)