Larry, could you be thinking of standard air entraining admixture?
Air entrained concrete is specified anywhere salt or other moisture and freezing temperatures will exist, to avoid spalling and make a workable mix with less water. There is a maximum spec for entrained air in such mixes. Aircrete is right off the opposite end of the scale regarding percentages of air, and typically is made up by adding a specific volume of special foam to a certain amount of fine concrete slurry.
I love the idea koen. Using this to dry and cool an air space using direct solar. Very good.
yes that is what i was talking about it prevents spalding in our cold weather. like I told you i wasnt sure why they used it but i thought that was what you were talking about sorry.I read somwhere in the states lower state dont remember were but the guy mixed durt with concrete and made adobe bricks by packing it. for building houses another mixed in paper and other stuff with concrete to make different products another thing for you to try . also to make rocket stoves they mix in fermica and stove ash for insulation???
You’ve heard right. I think you are referring to CEB, compressed earth blocks. Original concept originated in Guatemala. Apparently they have a compressive strength better than baked clay bricks. And can stand indefinite water submersion. Definitely not adobe, better than that.
Perlite can be used to lighten refractory mixes.
Had no idea the place was built like that. Must have been a huge earth-shaking BOOM! for the soldiers to have concussion symptoms. Would not have wanted to be anywhere nearby. Maybe an outer layer of aircreete / charcoal creete as a shock-absorber?? Thanks for the picture, Henry!
I havent checked much on it lately but when i was checking it out they called it adobe blocks that was some time ago it may go by soom other name now. but they ramed the mixture . maybe they improved the process by now. the cement was put in at that time to make it more water proof. that was back in the 80,s. i am not old just dating myself i guess.
There is also cinva ram and ceta rammed earth blocks. similar
ok like I said i haven’t looked at them in years thought about trying it years ago but life just got in the way now i have lost the ambision. i just don’t have the energy any more. this heat drains me.
I wanted to say something about using charcoal to filter water . Using a type of charcoal concreete
to filter agricultural water in a way best left to Army Corp of Engineers .
FILTRATION
SLOW SAND of 1 cubic meter passes about 2 liters/min, and does a limited bacteria removal.
PRESSURE SAND of 1 cubic meter passes about 40gpm and must be backwashed daily.
DIATOMACEOUS EARTH removes small suspended particles at high flow rates, must be daily backwashed and is expensive.
POROUS STONE/CERAMIC filters are small but expensive, and do not effect chemicals, bacteria or odors.
PAPER or CLOTH filters are disposable and filter to one micron, but do not have much capacity.
CHARCOAL:
-COMPRESSED CHARCOAL/CARBON BLOCK is the best type of charcoal filter, can remove chemicals and lead, but is easily clogged, so should be used with a sediment prefilter.
-GRANULAR CHARCOAL is cheaper, but water can flow around the granules without being treated.
-POWDERED CHARCOAL is a very fine dust useful for spot cleaning larger bodies of water, but is messy and can pass through some filters and be consumed.
REVERSE OSMOSIS uses a membrane with microscopic holes that require 4 to 8 times the volume of water processed to wash it in order to remove minerals and salt, but not necessarily chemicals and bacteria.
ENZYMES &BACTERIA combined can remove contaminants, reduce sludge, and even digest oil. See recent article on enzymes & bacteria.
PLANTS There are numerous plants, animals and organisms that are quite effective in filtering water.
REYKJAVIK, Iceland — Using enzymes and bacteria as separate methods for water filtration is not new to the industry but a combination of both is an innovation. Filtration company ZymeTech provides such a solution, which is a more efficient and eco-friendly filtration approach, according to the company’s managing director Alan Badenhorst, cited by Engineering News Online.
Badenhorst explained that conventional methods of filtration produce an amount of residue that remains inside the water container and needs to be disposed of, whereas the combination of enzyme and bacteria ensures a reduced amount of sludge. The by-product that remains after the filtration can then be further cleaned and reused. Traditional ways of cleaning the residue involve machines that pump it out and then transport it to hazardous-materials landfills, which pollute the environment.
According to ZymeTech operations director Ilan Zlotnick, the enzyme/bacteria method of filtration eliminates the need for using such machines because what is left in septic tanks or grease traps can often be recycled. He pointed out that enzymes can be used to replace chemicals and contribute to a more efficient use of raw materials, energy and water, which benefits both the environment and industry.
Creating the exact formulation of enzyme and bacteria to ensure effective filtration is not a simple task, Badenhorst explained. Various types of bacteria and enzymes are produced in Belgium by ZymeTech’s principal Realco, and each of them is intended to break down different type of organic waste matter including matter found in grease traps or septic tanks. Enzymes act like a natural filter to contamination and break it into small particles that can be then consumed by bacteria, which are all biodegradable and would die naturally in the absence of enzymes, he revealed.
Using bacteria and enzymes separately has its disadvantages, as enzymes may break down sludge but tiny particles of it will still be present in the effluent and accumulation of these particles will eventually clog drains. On the other hand, using bacteria only will not fully remove contamination from the water, as bacteria will not be active long enough to deal with the large sludge particles. Combining the two actually provides a perfect solution for filtration, as the way enzymes and bacteria react complement each other to ensure efficacy, Badenhorst claimed.
He noted that the technology has attracted significant interest from industries worldwide and increasingly in South Africa, where more businesses are starting to embrace a more environmentally friendly approach to their operations. The company said that the technology can also be used for filtration of water in areas where water pollution is a serious problem, especially in many parts of Africa, where access to pure drinkable water is restricted for many people. A solution to this problem has recently been introduced in South Africa by ZymeTech, which launched a product that can be used by campers and hikers to purify water and make it instantly ready for consumption.
You can buy foaming agents specifically for air crete on Amazon. Overall they are supposed to be considerably cheaper and more effective. I make Air crete and so far just use dawn. If you watch the honey do carpenter you-tube posts he says Suave foam last longer than Dawn but not much. There are a lot of different videos on making a foam generator. Mine seems simpler than most. I have pictures of how to build it if anyone is interested.
I am interested! ! !
We are over our monthly data limit Don. Lucky if I can get on line at times and takes about 10 minutes to load one picture. I’ll post about this when our data resets.
Apparently you can foam glass, metals and nanomaterials. Although temps probably make it prohibitive for most to do at home, but I ran across it looking for filter materials. (which it won’t work for because the air is trapped.). The glass is supposed to be a superior building material because of it’s insulation and load bearing capabilities. I didn’t look at the process, I got sidetracked on the nano… 
If you want another sidetrack, look into aerogels. I recall a fascinating article in SA maybe in the 80s?
I think there is a whole thread somewhere on here about aerogels. I have been sidetracked by those before. 
Glass is interesting to me however one video just said it is made by adding small bits of coal to molten glass so it is like the concrete I guesss. I will have to find something more definitive then a youtube video though.
Here is my Aircrete foam generator Don. Don’t know how much you want to know about it so I’ll just go all in and describe how it works. Basically the same as every other one on You-tube.
This upright part is the solution tank/ pressure pot. It’s just a piece of 3 inch PVC capped on the bottom and with a screw on cap on the top. In these pictures the grey hose will be carrying the solution. For me the solution so far is just Dawn dish soap and water. The gray hose has to be fitted above the top of the solution level. This pipe will hole two gallons. From there the grey hose go to the mixing wand.
Kind of hard to see what’s going on here but the tank and the wand need separate air supplies. Compressor air is fed to this manifold. I just had these toiler valves laying around so I used them. The vertical valve regulates pressure to the tank and the horizontal one to the wand.
The wand is a piece of two inch PVC . The top unscrews below the cap with the two quarter inch airline valves in it. The valves on the tank are set so the pressure is more than required by the mixing wand. My compressor is set at 100 PSI and I don’t have a gauge on the tank anywhere but I’d guess pressure there is about 50 psi. You adjust the ball valves on the wand to get optimal solvent flow and air flow to make foam. It’s trial and error. Inside the wand are stainless steel scrubby pads. The solution is forced through them with the air pressure and you get foam. The wand doesnt have to be a particular size. As long as you can get the pads in there. I used two inch because at the nozzle end of the tube you need something in place to keep the air from driving the pads down and blocking the nozzle. I used a thing you put on a counter top cake mixer and it was 2 inch diameter. Here is a a couple pictures of the components in an exploded view.
Hope I didn’t make this sound to complicated. Actually pretty simple. You make the foam as dense as you can. Mix cement and water with a paint mixer in a drill. Pour the two together and mix them with the drill and pour the stuff into a form. It can be cut with a saw and you can make pretty much anything you want with it.
Thanks for the reply and the pics Tom. What do you make with it?
I have built wood framed geodesic domes before. I was looking on line and saw one built from triangles poured from aircrete. I was going to get dairy goats and thought I’d build a aircrete dome shed for them to live in. Decided I don’t want to take care of animals so that’s on the back burner. I’ve made some test blocks but so far that’s all I’ve played with. I think I mentioned that I just build stuff but don’t always use it. I am going to make some raised bed panels with it this fall though.
Right now I have to get the garden harvested and canned and dehydrated and then I’ll start other things. I am going to start a wood dryer this week though. Going to be in the eighties and humid again all week. I don’t function well with that kind of weather.
About the foam generator. All the air tool fittings are 1/4 NPT. To thread them into the PVC you need a 7/16 drill and a 1/2-20 tap. A fitting will usually cut it’s own threads into PVC though, especially if you heat the hole a little with a micro-torch.
