Sunday, November 21, 2010

VAST, Re-use a Vast Range of Materials

Forever searching for reused permanent materials I stumble across Vast Pavers. Made from up to 95% recycled materials, these pavers are said to be longer lasting than concrete pavers with fly ash They will also meaningfully contribute to Stormwater Design, Regional Materials and Waste Management. http://vastpavers.com/products/composite_paver/permeable_composite_paver.php

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Large Tyre Planters

As before this is a simple set of instructions on how to get the most out of old tyres. You can find old tyres anywhere really. The trash heap, abandoned in the bush or polluting the local creek. You might even know where there is a commercial stack just waiting to be used by a smart recycler.
For this project you will need star pickets as well between
4 and 6. It all depends how fussy you are about the strength of the planter.

Links To Papercrete Recipies

Papercrete is a kind of adobe mixture of cement and paper. First used in the 1920's it has become popular with eco home builders who are after light weight cement and also want to extend the amount of cement they get from one bag. I don't have a favorite recipe as such but tend to adapt as I go. Generally I like twice the amount of paper to cement. I don't care what sort of cement I use and the sand content is by following the instructions on the bag . I will sometimes add plaster just to get a smoother effect. But if your pedantic about amounts here's some links

http://www.mortarsprayer.com/papercrete/mix-papercrete/

http://www.ehow.com/how_2383788_make-papercrete.html

http://papercreteparadise.blogspot.com/2009/05/latex-cement-skirting-for-mobile-home.html

Some Uses for Old Tyres

In my searches on the net I have come across lots of great uses for old tyres. A lot of which I am going to get around to doing myself. But as I have said before there are some ideas of my own I will investigate. Ideas that can keep a tyre useful long after its wear and tear has made it redundant for use on a car. One idea I have is to make a stack of tyres become a large raised planter.

Here is how it gets done. Get three tyres and cut the tops and bottoms of each. Leave a small lip so each can be stacked on top of one another. Then burn or drill holes that will take nuts and bolts through them. This is in order to secure some wire mesh around the outside. Once secure the tyres can then be coated in "papercrete", which is a form of D.I.Y lightweight concrete that will give the tyres an aesthetic coat. You can colour it with oxides before it completely sets.

Really Recycling

It occurred to me some years ago that recycling is really just another way of saying something is in pause between use and landfill. That pollution was inevitable given that eventually the trash we try to recycle will, at some time or another end up in the bin. I have read articles on the subject of waste recycling and the failure for the government backed ventures to offer solutions that really benefit the environment. These tend more to give people peace of mind rather than truth . This got me thinking that we in the 1st world need to devise ways of either designing something to have two purposes or find better ways to recycle what we already have around us into permanent useful things. I think that for example, denim insulation made from old jeans is a great benefit to affordable insulation. So similarly I have started to design and devise ways to use things we take for granted when we consider recycling. Though there are tons of ways to recycle the things I will mention, I am putting forward some "new" ideas about how best to use throw away items.