The lack of innovation in masonry

Masonry has existed as a form of construction for thousands of years.  Its lineage predates recorded history, and is steeped in tradition and long-established practice.  While other fields of human endeavor have undergone fundamental changes and have evolved over time, the basic practice of masonry has not really changed much over thousands of years.  A mason from 1,000 BC would recognize today’s masonry techniques as being very much akin to what was practiced over 3,000 years ago.

Why has masonry remained fundamentally unchanged for so long?  What factors have contributed to masonry remaining essentially static over such a long period of human history amidst dramatic changes and new developments in virtually all other fields of human creativity?

This is a curious question which is difficult to answer.  Others have addressed this question, and their findings are worth looking at.  An article from 1989 by Clayford T. Grimm asks this question, and is appropriately titled “Why are there so few innovations in masonry?”  Mr. Grimm posed this question to a steering committee for a workshop on masonry research sponsored by the National Science Foundation (USA).   Committee members included the Masonry Institute of America, the National Concrete Masonry Association, and Clemson University faculty members.  Their findings are noteworthy, and are listed as follows:

1.  U.S. tort law.

2.  The bureaucratic building code process.

3.  The unfunded process of writing consensus standards.

4.  Industry fragmentation.  “Economic pressures for fast construction time leave little time for the learning curve required by new ideas.  The construction industry mind-set supports the status quo.”

5.  Research fragmentation.  No government agency is funded to research masonry problems.  Given today’s fiscal challenges of government, there is not likely to be any such agency in the foreseeable future.

6.  Educators teach what they know and few of them know much about masonry.

7.  Designers are reluctant to use masonry structurally because of poor jobsite quality control.

8.  Academicians who dream up new names for old ideas and make a career out of it.

9.  Designers who don’t care about mason productivity.

10.  Lack of financial incentive.  “Why should a builder build a $50,000 house for a low-income family when for about the same effort he can build a $150,000 house and make a lot more money?”

[This article was originally published by The Masonry Society, and presented at a workshop sponsored by the National Science Foundation in Washington DC, August 28-30, 1988]

While the points made in the article as discussed above are important and noteworthy, it seems that there is still more to the question of why masonry remains essentially unchanged and is resistant to innovation.

One seemingly obvious factor points to the long history of masonry, across geography and among different societies, countries and cultures.  Because masonry has been practiced for so long, and has been developed as an art for so long, it has already been rather fully developed.  As such, there appears to be little room for improvement or innovation.  This may seem trivial or obvious, yet I believe it is worth stating.

The notion that masonry has been fully developed over several thousand years and cannot be substantially improved upon is strengthened by the contemporary practice of masonry research.  Contemporary masonry research is primarily involved with the analysis of Romanesque, gothic, medieval and other ancient masonry structures.  Most notable masonry engineers have spent their careers looking back at some of the great architecture of humanity’s past accomplishments to gain a more complete understanding of the engineering involved.  For example, Jacques Heyman has done extensive analysis of masonry architecture in several books such as The Stone Skeleton (Structural Engineering of Masonry Architecture)  Cambridge University Press, 1995.  Mr. Heyman has a long list of such publications, each of which looks at explaining the engineering involved in old masonry structures.  Current masonry engineering work has a real focus on the past.

Another factor in explaining the lack of innovation brought to masonry is the mistaken notion that old ideas re-discovered and re-introduced are in fact new.  One example of this is the thin-shelled catalan arches originally developed in Europe (especially Valencia, Spain) in the 14^th century.  This type of masonry was re-introduced as a “new” type of construction in the US by Raphael Guastavino in the 19^th century in the US.  More recently, similar work is being done by people at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; it is also being touted as “new” but it remains essentially unchanged since the 14^th century.  MIT’s work on catalan arches is essentially derivative of much earlier work.  This phenomenon is close to #8 on the list which began this blog, as described by C.T. Grimm.

Finally, there is a curious and fascinating observation made by Frank J. Sulloway in his watershed book Born to Rebel  (Vintage Books, 1997; New York Times “notable book of the year”).  “Sulloway's most important finding is that eldest children identify with parents and authority, and support for the status quo, whereas younger children rebel against it. Drawing on the work of Darwin and the new science of evolutionary psychology, he transforms our understanding of personality development and its origins in the family.”  Sulloway describes how virtually all truly innovative ideas are the product of a last-born or later-born child, and explains this as a means to gain their parent’s attention.  It is essentially a Darwinian survival mechanism.  Conversely, first-borns are much more conservative and tend to end up in positions of power and authority.  These factors combine to create a scenario wherein a last-born innovator is presenting an innovative idea to a CEO or president or other authority who is typically a first-born conservative thinker.  While this idea may appear esoteric and irrelevant at first, I believe it has real merit.

Where do I see myself and my innovations in masonry?  I am a last-born child (youngest of four).   Are my ideas real innovations?  I believe they are; others do too.  I have had several US patents awarded for my ideas.  They were also identified as a “Cutting Edge Technology” by the American Concrete Institute.  Finally, there is no other masonry system like the one which I have developed.  How can this be?  I do not imagine myself some sort of unique genius.  I think I have been fortunate to have investigated ground which others have not.  Part of this is due to the fact that geodesic geometry was most recently developed by R. Buckminster Fuller (first developed by the ancient Greeks).  It was my good fortune that Fuller assigned great value to how much a building weighed (as I have discussed several times earlier on this blog).  This aspect of Fuller’s thinking was closely held by his followers, which meant that masonry was never considered as a suitable construction material; it was always thought to be too heavy.  His bias against massive material such as masonry left a niche for me to investigate and develop as I have.  My experience as a ceramic artist and mold maker provided me with the insight and awareness of mold releases, undercuts and interlocking features.  My education in geology and fault mechanisms opened my eyes to conjugate shearing.  Through focus and hard work I brought these things together in an innovative masonry design.

Is there room for real innovation in masonry today?  I think there is!  

Proportionality, strength and buoyancy

I have written several times on this blog about how masonry structures are scaleable.  That is, a given masonry structure can be made larger or smaller and will still have adequate strength, so long as the proportions remain intact.  For example, if a round arch is ten feet in radius and has walls which are one foot thick, then the same design will work with one hundred foot radius and walls which are ten feet thick.

The example cited above is a good one to look at because a “thin-shelled structure” is defined as having a ratio of radius-to-wall thickness of ten-to-one.  This ratio of radius-to-wall thickness provides adequate strength for a masonry arch under earth’s gravity.

If we take this example one step further, and consider not just a semi-circular round arch (or barrel vault, or Roman arch) but we look at a complete sphere, such that the arch describes a completed circle, then we have a spherical structure which can have strength adequate to withstand the pressures at great depth, underwater.

Going further still, if we look at the example of a sphere whose wall thickness is one tenth of its radius, we see that such a sphere will always be buoyant in water, no matter what size it is.  A small hollow concrete sphere 2 inches in diameter, with concrete walls 0.1 inches thick, will have the same proportional buoyancy as a sphere 200 feet in diameter with concrete walls 10 feet thick.

Since the volume of a sphere is (4/3) * pi * r³; the density of concrete is around 2.4 g/cc; and the density of water is around 1.0 g/cc, it is a simple matter to show that the buoyant force acting on a hollow concrete sphere with wall thickness equal to one-tenth of its radius will always exceed the weight of the concrete.  Such a sphere will always float, no matter how big it is or how thick its walls get. (I can show the math, but spare the reader here.  It’s simple stuff).

Given that thicker concrete walls are stronger, a larger sphere (following the scaleability rule for masonry) can be made of great size, with great wall thickness, and can be sunk to great depth and can maintain structural integrity under the great forces found there.  Another feature of increasing the radius of such a hollow sphere is the exponential increase in volume.  As the radius increases linearly, the volume is increased as a function of the radius cubed.

These simple facts of proportionality, buoyancy, strength and volume regarding a submerged masonry sphere are really pretty interesting.  It indicates that a sphere can be used at great depth, if it is made large enough.  The increase in scale will simultaneously provide the economy of scale for tasks such as desalination, as described several times earlier on this blog (here, here and here).  Simple yet elegant.

Radioactive trowels and robots

Today there was an interesting item on the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's blog about a radioactive trowel.  Here's the item, about how the president almost handled a radioactive trowel:

Uncovering the real story of Joe Ball's trowel required research at the Department of Energy's archives, where I could get more information about the AEC’s move from Washington, D.C., to Germantown, Md., in 1957. The AEC's move was precipitated by the Soviet Union development of thermonuclear weapons. To survive a 20 megaton blast over the capital mall, AEC offices needed to be at least 20 miles away. Germantown was selected over 50 other sites.

This Cold-War move coincided with new initiatives by the AEC to promote civilian nuclear power plant construction. Thus, the dedication ceremony became a chance to highlight the atom's contribution to national defense and its potential peaceful applications.

The AEC created a ceremony heavy in symbolism. Electricity from batteries charged by eight military and civilian power reactors lifted a curtain on a commemorative plaque in the new building lobby. A time capsule was placed behind the cornerstone packed with military and civilian artifacts, such as pictures of the Nautilus and scraps of linen wrappings for the Dead Sea scrolls dated by radiocarbon techniques.

As I found out from the DOE archives, AEC Chairman Lewis Strauss wanted even more symbols for the dedication ceremony. He asked for a trowel with some historical significance and Argonne National Laboratory obliged, including, as mentioned in Part I, creating a blade made from uranium. AEC officials liked the trowel and planned on giving speeches about its symbolism to local groups.

But there was a problem.

The uranium metal had been reused for many years in other experimental reactors, most likely in the CP-2. The uranium was still radioactive, enough that an Argonne official told the AEC to use only the handle and not touch the blade. Hoping to preclude objections from the White House, the AEC medical staff reassured the Secret Service that the trowel was a “unique opportunity” for Eisenhower “to demonstrate under completely safe conditions the proper way to perform an operation involving radioactive material.”

AEC assurances didn't work. Ike's staff refused to allow the president to touch anything radioactive. Stymied, the AEC substituted three silver-plated trowels. The uranium trowel was dropped from the ceremony and the silver-plated trowels that history records were used instead. The fate of the symbolic trowels – of which there were either two or three – were mostly lost to history, with one spending decades in storage at Eisenhower College's old campus.

Joe Ball's unusual auction win find reminds us why we love artifacts—their stories are fun. They teach us about the society that made them. The CP-1 trowel was born out of an optimism in the possibilities of the atomic age, but even in the 1950s radiation concerns proved powerful. Today most people likely sympathize with the White House's fear of radiation, and the trowel probably seems like a questionable use of radioactive material.

And so Argonne's creation reminds us how the nation had changed in the last half century in shifting to a more sober attitude toward nuclear hazards.

Joe Ball has graciously agreed to loan the trowel to the NRC , where it is now displayed in our lobby.

Tom Wellock

NRC Historian

Also today, an item in the news about Chernobyl's new containment structure coming closer to being completed. 

 

 

It seems to me that robots should be the only ones handling radioactive trowels.  

 

Building a water storage tank

Today I'm looking back at the construction of a water storage tank.  It's now all done, and it's interesting to look at how it came together.  This tank is made from manufactured concrete block, using a method which I have several patents on.  I've posted several pictures below showing the construction steps.

This particular tank has an inside diameter of around 7 feet.  It holds around 3,000 gallons.  It is being used as a rainwater harvesting (rwh) tank.  I am using it as a plunging tank to cool off after you take a sauna, which I also built.  The tank has an electric light (LED's) at its bottom center.  There is a ladder which conforms to its spherical inner shape, for easy "in & out."

This tank was easy to build, and should last a very long time.  I hope to be using it to collect rainwater and as part of my wood-fired sauna experience for years to come.  If we assume concrete block cost $1 each, this tank cost me $175, which seems like a pretty good value.  Similar tanks for rainwater harvesting can have many uses: from potable water, to fire suppression systems, to watering crops, etc.  It has a hinged lid to keep insects out and to keep the water clean.  Rainwater is collected from the sauna roof, which is around 1,000 square feet.

I hurt myself (chainsaw accident!) while I was working on this, it took some time to heal.  The actual time to build this entire thing was very short though; less than a week.

The grey plastic pipe was used to run electric wire for the underwater light: thinking ahead.

Some of these mortar joints (especially near the top) are intentionally extra 

thick, this stretches the sphere and makes the water tank deeper. Easily done.

This is the electric light I installed in the bottom center of the tank.  LED's.

The light installed.  It is over 8 feet down to the bottom.

This is the finished tank, with my puppy Bartleby investigating.

Here is the actual sauna room.

 Here's a shower I put in.  The building also has a toilet, sink, bedroom and upstairs deck (outside).

This was a fun project, and I can't wait to use it!

Werner Von Braun and the Civic

Several years ago I made a trip to Alpena, Michigan to meet and speak with Besser Company.  They make machines and equipment to mass-produce concrete products, such as masonry blocks.   They are global leaders in the industry.

I met with an engineer, and tried briefly to explain my ideas.  He interrupted me, and brought in the Vice President.  I began to try to explain my ideas to the Vice President, but he also cut me short.

“Can you give our President a ride to Ann Arbor tomorrow?”

I was taken aback.  Isn’t one of the Lear jets available? I stupidly wondered.

“Sure!”  I said, “I’d be happy to.”

I picked up Mr. James Park at his house, having spent the previous 24 hours cleaning my Honda Civic as best I could.  We began our 4 hour drive, and spoke.  It was the very point of the whole thing.  He is an easy man to talk to.

I described how I thought this masonry system could be used, in various applications.  I went through one application after another.  “What else you got?” he kept asking.

I didn’t want to seem silly or crazy, or goofy; I’m the guy proposing triangular block already.  But I said it anyway.

“Lunar blocks.  Like on the moon.  The cost of sending materials from earth is too great, we should use what’s there, and with robots, this block system would…”

He interrupted by laughing.   He laughed heartily and deeply.  Uh-oh, I thought:  I’ve gone too far.

He then explained his laughter. 

Every year Besser would create a special limited edition hardbound leather book of general interest, and would send this book to their very valued customers, as a sign of appreciation.  One year the subject of the book was Rocketry.  One particular customer of Besser happened to be friends with –none other than- Werner Von Braun, the father of modern rocketry. 

Werner Von Braun was so taken with Besser’s book on Rocketry that he sent them a letter, in which he assured them that when man built on the moon, they would do so in something like the masonry manner which I had just suggested, and that it would be done on Besser equipment. 

We both had a good laugh in my Honda Civic, with Werner Von Braun grinning in the back seat as we pulled into Ann Arbor.

 

Corrugations and ribs in a masonry arch

In a masonry roman arch (or round arch) the arch may be viewed as a horizontal half-cylinder.   The arch is subject to stresses from gravity which are represented by a catenary thrust line, as discussed several times on this blog (here, here and here).   Various techniques may be employed to strengthen the round arch against the thrusting forces of its catenary load.

A cylinder may –in turn- be seen as a shell structure, as also discussed several times on this blog.  An arch as a shell structure is seen as a curved plate.  A plate may employ various techniques to provide it with greater flexural rigidity. 

Flexural rigidity, or increased structural stiffness, may be achieved by providing corrugations in the plate.  Corrugations are defined as a series of parallel ridges or furrows.  One example of this which most people are familiar with is corrugated cardboard. 

Corrugated  paper (also called pleated) was patented in England in 1856 and was used as a liner for tall hats; tall hats which are nothing more than cylinders. 

 

Another example of cylinders being made stronger by corrugations are the tin cans which employ corrugations to give them greater rigidity.

As I discussed earlier in this blog, I have developed triangular block to make cylinders and arches.  There are two types of triangular blocks used to assemble into a cylinder, or section of cylinder, or arch.  I call these two types of blocks “flat” and par” because one has a flat top, and the other has abutting edges which are parallelograms. 

 

Each of these blocks has a “tilt” to it which departs from the vertical.  If the triangle which describes these blocks is lower and wider (more obtuse of a triangle) then the amount of “tilt” or departure from vertical is increased.  If the triangle which describes these blocks is taller and skinnier (more acute of a triangle) then the amount of “tilt” is decreased.

The tilt or “leaning” of the triangular blocks used to assemble a cylinder have the effect of introducing corrugations, or ribs into the arch.  These corrugations or ribs have the much desired and beneficial effect of increasing the flexural rigidity and strength of the resulting arch.  The effect is the same as the corrugations in a tin can, as shown above.  The structure is made much stronger and more robust to any applied force; whether it is gravity, wind loads, hurricanes, tornadoes or impacts.

This feature is a simple artifact of the design of these block, it is something of a “happy accident.”  Thus masonry arches made with corrugations are much stronger, more robust and better than a simple, rounded arch. 

A sauna firebox: planned and being made

Here is a look at a firebox I’m building for a sauna.  Below are two short videos, showing the initial planning and the firebox as almost complete. 

I used old kiln shelves for the horizontal top of the firebox and the flame-wrapping structure above it.

I’ll post another entry when this is all done.  It should look quite different by then.

Planning the firebox:

Firebox almost done: