Brick Estimation Form New And Improved

Well during my break time I tackled revamping my Brick Estimation Form. I am now officially calling it version 2. I did this to make the form more flexible so that it could be used for more complex situations.

Version 2 can estimate the bricks for straight walls, straight foundations, curved walls, curved foundations, vault ceilings, full and partial domes. The domes and vaults can be ceilings or stand alone structures. The curved walls can be anything from full circles to a fractional section used for rounded corners. Any fraction of a circle can be used in combination with the straight walls. This will allow you to have the flexibility to estimate the needed bricks for almost any shape or design that you can think of.

I have also added the option to include arches in the walls. The form will calculate the number of bricks for the arches with the bricks having the ends exposed. It will then also calculate the left over area inside the arches and estimate how many bricks that would be and subtract that number from the total number of bricks estimated.

All of the totals will now be displayed on the first tab. Each category of wall type also now has it's own tab in order to enter the information on. All the information will be calculated and then displayed on the first tab. The brick and mortar joint information is entered on on the first tab and is required for all of the calculations so I would recommend entering that information first. This holds true for the wall thickness as well. The wall thickness is measured in bricks. So if the wall is 1 brick thick then enter 1. If the wall has bricks laid width wise with 1 brick laid lengthwise against the end count that as 1.5 bricks. From the examples you can see how to adjust the wall thickness even thicker if needed.

The desired heights of the walls and foundations are also entered on the first tab. I say desired heights because you have to work with the thickness of the bricks and thickness of the mortar joints. I added a calculation to each of the straight and curved categories so that you can see what the actual heights would be based on your desired height.

As you can see from the picture above I have added some color coding as well to make it easier to know where to enter the information and easier to quickly read the results.

I am again making the forms available in the Excel (Windows) format and the LibreOffice (Linux) format for download at the links below. I have also removed the links in my previous post for the version 1 form. I have also removed the version 1 files and am only making the new version 2 available.

Brick Estimation Form 2.0.xls

Brick Estimation Form 2.0.ods


I am providing this form free for personal use just like I did before however, after doing some research I decided to include the following terms as a nonnegotiable contract and terms of use which is enforceable under international law. Here are the terms "The downloading and use of this form constitutes consent of anyone downloading or using this form to the following binding agreement. This form is free for personal use, use by non-profit organizations, teachers, students, trainers or any other group with the purpose of helping others learn about earthen building or assist in earthen building on the condition that this form is not being used in any way to make profit. Any government agency, person, business or corporation wishing to use this form for profit or in conjunction with making profit from it's use shall be required to donate the time and materials to host a free (no fee) workshop (or training session listed by any other name), open to any and all people interested, focused on building an earthen structure (domicile or home) and during which a complete earthen structure will be built. At the end of said workshop the structure will be donated to a needy family or individual person free of charge. This agreement is valid under international law may not be changed, amended or affected by any implied contracts without the express written permission of the author of this form. This form may not be changed or modified in any way  without the express written permission of the author of this form.".

I wrote the terms in this manner as a way to help encourage businesses, corporations and governments to help get the earthen building information out there to help people. The more people learn about this kind of building the better off we'll all be. I hope this small step may encourage other people to do similar things. I figure if enough of us are all doing things to help and teach others while getting through to the businesses, corporations and governments that they need to help as well and that we will be holding them accountable then I think we could be successful in affecting some positive change.

Break Time And Playing In The Mud

I guess you could say I've reached my breaking point. I'm referring to that literally. As those of you who have read my blog from the beginning know, I suffer from permanent injuries from an accident when I was a firefighter. Well I have reached the point where I just did way too much and now I need time to heal.

So in my last post I showed the rebuilding of the cement mixer. Having to weld and grind leaning over at those angles really aggravated my back. So when I was done with the cement mixer I was pretty sore  and I should have stopped and rested, but I didn't. As you can also see from my last post I decided to move and stack all of bricks that we had made. I needed moved so I could have the space to make and lay down more.

Well, let me tell you what a mistake that was. Ok let me explain. Rather than picking up a few bricks at a time and making a hundred plus trips to move the bricks I decided to use my garden cart. Now when you lift a brick that is between 8 and 10 pounds you don't think about the weight much but, when you get a cart loaded with 40 - 50 bricks it turns out to be really heavy. Somewhere between 400 to 500 pounds. Well a normal healthy adult could handle moving that cart all afternoon and just be sore the next day. Me on the other hand, well I knew I was hurting after the second cart full but, I had more to move so I kept going. Being stubborn does have some advantages but, it also has some disadvantages. One disadvantage is that now I have to take time heal.

My injuries are essentially the whole right side of my body, my back, neck and my head. I know that sounds like a lot but, it is and it's painful. Most of the time I just control myself and deal with the pain to get things done but, when I push it like I did with moving the bricks my body pushes back. I'm sure some of you out there can understand that. So I just take some time, maybe a few days to a week, to recover and let the pain level come back down so I can get back to work.

Ok I'm sure someone's asking by now, "Why is this guy talking about this? What does this guy hurting have anything to do with building the kitchen?". Well I've talked to a lot of people about my kitchen project and they are surprised and astounded at what I'm doing. Most of them, who are in much better shape than I am, don't believe that they can do anything like that and are shocked and amazed that I'm able to build this kitchen. I want people to understand that I'm working on things a little bit at a time. Yes sometimes I do a little too much and I have to recover from it but, once I recover I'm back at it. I want people to understand that if as injured, messed up and as out of shape as I am that if I can work with these materials and build this kitchen then just about anyone can.

Yes I said just about anyone can do this! Let me say that again, just about anyone can do this! We live on, around and in earth so why not work with that earth. This whole process builds out of a mixture of clay earth, sand and water. This is just an advanced form of playing in the mud. Only now when we play in the mud it has purpose. The wonderful thing about playing in the mud is that you can always come back to it, get it wet and play with it some more. As you've seen on this blog my kids have been involved and been able to do this. At this point the youngest child to get their hands in the mud was 10 years old and I'm in my 40's disabled with permanent injuries. So like I said just about anyone can do this and I want to encourage others out there to go for it. Don't be afraid and think that you can't do it, if you can play in the mud then you can make bricks, benches, walls, floors, ovens, fireplaces, planters, saunas, even houses and whatever else you can think of.

Ok there are always those people who say well what if I mess up? It's mud, get it wet and do it again until you get what you want. There are also those people who say well I'm not artistic or creative. So what? Since when did you have to be artistic or creative to play in the mud? The best thing that I can tell you is to get out of your head and stop thinking about what you can't do. Just think about what you want, maybe make some sketches to work from or draw more detailed plans if you like. Some people don't draw anything and just go for it. Whatever works for you just go for it. If you can think it you can build it.

One quick note about building with earth. I hear people say things like how poor people live in dirt houses. When I hear that stuff all I can say is that I want to live in a dirt house. People build with materials for several reasons. They use what's available, what they've been convinced to use or they use materials for prestige. Believe it or not in the "Modern Countries" (in quotes because I don't think the ideas of not beings honest with the countries populace or finding ways to keep people down in order to make money from their misery are modern ideas) the last 2 reasons are the most common. Building with earth is not for the poor it's for the most responsible. It costs the least, is the most ecological way to build and is available to everyone. It's also fire proof folks. What more could we ask for? So don't be afraid to play in the mud.

I'll be posting more after I take a little time to heal.

Cement Mixer Reborn

I said in my last post that I was going to work in the cement mixer. Well that turned into a much larger job than expected. I found some cracks in the base of the mixer barrel so I had to remove the barrel and disassemble it in order to get to the cracks. While the barrel was disassembled I cleaned all of the pieces of hardened concrete and lime/clay mixture out as you can see in the picture to the left. The problem here is that now I had lots of exposed metal. So after I was done welding, grinding and cleaning I decided I would give the

barrel a coat of paint to protect the metal.So I gave the inside of the barrel a coat of paint as you can see in the picture. I only had black high temperature paint or gloss white Rustolium paint. So I went with the gloss white. I gave everything a couple of light coats and then one slightly heavier coat before spray painting the other sides.

So the next step was to flip everything over and spray some light coats on the the side. After letting it dry for a while I again sprayed a slightly heavier coat. I left all of the pieces sit and dry for a couple of hours

After letting everything cure and dry for a couple of hours I reassembled the mixer barrel. I also gave all of the bolts and nuts a couple of light coats of the white paint as well. Then I left the barrel to dry and harden.

While the mixer barrel was drying I moved and stacked all of the bricks in the kitchen area so they would be close to where the were going to be installed. That may not look like much but, oh man was I exhausted after getting all of those moved and stacked. Each brick weighs between 8 and 10 LBS and there is a total of 462 bricks there. That's a lot of weight but, I got them all moved.

I did have to replace the bolts, washers and nuts that mount the mixer barrel to the mixer. The old ones were bent, stripped and rusted bad. So with those replaced I bolted the mixer barrel back on to the mixer. I also used some silicone caulking to seal the barrel mounting bolts and nuts both inside and on the outside of the mixing barrel. Since the old original rubber gasket was destroyed when I got the mixer. The silicone makes for a water tight seal so nothing drips out the end and makes a huge mess. I also added a bead of silicone between the mixer barrel and the mounting plate to make sure everything was sealed. Well with a new coat of paint and everything put back together I should be ready for rest of the bricks, floors and counters now. Yes I do realize that the spray paint will only last so long on the inside of the mixer barrel but, it gives the new metal some protection from rust. Beside, it's not very hard to give the inside of the barrel a new coat every so often. Considering the cement mixer was free to begin with I have no complaints. Yes I know I didn't paint the rest of the cement mixer. There was 1 major reason for that. I only had enough paint for the mixer barrel. I know pretty simple reason but, an extremely accurate and understandable one. So now on to more bricks.

Still More Bricks

Well we reached the end of day 3 of making the foundation bricks. Well we successfully laid up another 167 bricks today. So that will bring our total foundation bricks made to date up to 429. That's the good news.

The bad news is that my boys just don't get laying the bricks in straight lines.

You can see the row of bricks on the right side. That was the first row they laid. This was after I had already talked to them about where to lay the bricks down and in what direction. There is a time to be creative but, when you're trying to get the most efficient use of space is not the time to be creative. For those of you who have teenagers you know what I'm talking about.

So after laying the first row and having yet another discussion they corrected hings and began laying the second row on the right. Not too bad of news but, this is were it starts.

The second part of the bad news is that I ran out of lime. I had 2 50 LBS bags of lime slacked and ready to use for this and I ran out. As it turns out since I was adding lime by volume rather that weight I needed more than I thought. So I have to get some more lime and slack it for at least 24 hours before I use it. That shouldn't be to hard since I ran into another issue as well.

The third part of the bad news is my other issue. For those of you that have read my blog from the beginning know that when I got the cement mixer the barrel of the mixer failed very shortly after I started using it. I had to take it all apart and weld the barrel back together to fix the failure. Well after all of batches of adobe/cob that I have mixed it seems that a weld or two has started to crack. So I think tomorrow I'll get the lime and put it in the can to slack it and then work on the cement mixer over the weekend. That way the lime has time to slack and I can use the down time to tear apart the cement mixer, check everything and make any repairs needed. This way I'll have my cement mixer back in top shape and ready for the next 1000 plus bricks that I need to make.

I'm planning on making making concrete counter tops as well plus an adobe floor so I'll need that cement mixer running. I'll post more about what happened to the cement mixer so that anyone else using one will know what to watch out for.

More And More Bricks

Like I said at the end of my last post a mixer paddle in the cement mixer broke and was going to have to be welded before we started this morning. So this morning I went out and started to take out the broken mixer paddle pieces. To my surprise I found that the second mixer paddle had also broken away  from the bottom mounting tab. So with that I pulled both of the mixer paddles and their mounting tabs. Then it was on to cleaning them up, aligning them and welding them together. Just to be on the safe side I added a little bit of reinforcing weld on the 1 mounting tab that had not broken. Then I remounted the mixer paddles in the cement mixer. I had to run some errands and we ate a late lunch after I got back.

I ran a bunch of straw through the shredder also and filled a large black contractor trash bag full of the shredded straw so I wouldn't run out. Yesterday I ran out of straw on the last batch. I had just enough for the batch but, that was it. So today I shredded more to make sure that I wouldn't run out.

So by the time we actually got started it was about 3:30 PM MST. Since we (Charles, Jason and me) had all been working yesterday and all day today we decided to mix and lay up bricks for about 2 hours.

So here are all the bricks laid up from day 1 and day 2. In total we've laid up 262 bricks. Yes I know my boys can't lay bricks down in a straight line. We've honestly only worked on laying up the bricks for about 5 hours total between both days. That's an average of over 50 bricks an hour. Not too shabby for just 2 of us at any given time. I've been running the mixer and setting up the mixes and either Charles or Jason have been laying down the bricks. Maybe we'll spend a few more hours laying up the bricks next time. It should only take 1 or 2 more days to make all of the foundation bricks.

Laying Up The Foundation Bricks

So here we are again making bricks. As I said at the end of my last post I had saved all of the clay soil that I had dug out of the foundation trenches. I piled all of it up by the mixer to use it for making bricks. I figured why go haul the clay soil from the other side of the property when I had so much from digging the foundation trenches.

Ok we (my son Charles and I) got ready to start this morning and I found that my shredder / mulcher wasn't working. So I had to work on the shredder. I ended up having to replace the switch in order to get it working. Once I got the shredder working I was ready to start making bricks. Yeah, that didn't happen. I found that one of the mixer paddles in my cement mixer had broken. So I had to pull out the welder to fix the broken mixer paddle. Once that was done then we could finally get to making the foundation bricks.

So I did a little math to decide how much slacked lime to use. In order to get the 5% - 7% of lime in the mix to be able to get lime stabilized adobe bricks I needed about 1 gallon of the slacked lime. I used a coffee can that was just under a gallon. So I had to use 1 full can of lime and a second can about 1/4 of the way filled. I also found that if I added some water first then added the lime before anything else, then the lime would get fully mixed into the water. Then I added the sand to the mix. This allows for the lime to be thoroughly and evenly mixed throughout all of the adobe mix. Once the line and 2 buckets of sand were mixed I would then add 1 bucket of the clay soil and 1 bucket of the shredded straw. I kept mixing until everything was mixed well adding water only as needed to keep the consistency of the mix. I wanted the mix to be fairly stiff and sticky like frosting but, with just a little slump so that it would release from the mold.

Even after all of the issues that we had to deal with in the morning we were able to get 141 bricks laid up in the afternoon. We called it quits about 5:30 PM MST. I mixed 7 loads in the mixer and Charles pressed the bricks into the form to lay them down. You can see Charles standing with all of the bricks in the picture.

The one downside to the day was that on the last batch I mixed up the mixer paddle broke again. So tomorrow morning I'll have to pull the pieces out and weld them up then reinstall the mixing paddle before I can start mixing more batches tomorrow. My thanks to the gods for the inspiration that lead to the creation of the electric wire feed arc welder. Don't leave home without it! After the repair it'll be back to making bricks.

Foundations . . . Just Dig It

So in my last post I had estimated that I would need 614 bricks for the foundation. That works out to 4 courses of bricks and bedding joints. That makes the foundation 14 inches from the floor level. I ran string lines at the floor level and dug down measuring 14 inches. That puts the top of the foundation at the same level as the floor.

You can see in the pictures the string lines that I put up. I used these as a guide to measure from so that I can dig my foundation trenches at a consistent 14 inches. Anywhere that I didn't have a string to work from I was able to use a level to keep the depth consistent.

You can see in the following pictures all of the foundations dug out to 14 inches deep from the level of the floor and checked with a level to make sure the bricks can be laid level and evenly. Do to the slope of the ground the trenches closet to the house are much deeper than the trenches close to the large oven. There are a coupe of trenches where I will have to add more to the bedding to bring them up to the correct level. I'm not worried about adding to the trenches on the end because whatever I add will be underneath the level of the lower floor. I still have to lay out the rest of the lower floor but, I already know that it will be high enough to lock in the foundations from the upper floor.

I decided to go ahead and dig the full foundation all the way around all of the counters. This just makes the counters stronger. I'll be infilling the open space in the bottom of the counters plus 1 or 2 bricks so that the floor level inside the counters is higher that the main floor level. That way when I fill in the main floor there won't be any way for the foundation to shift.

As you can see in the pictures my dogs and cats are having lots of fun with the trenches for the foundations. I had to train my dogs as I was working to not cross the strings that I had put up. My cats however thought it was just a new playground for them.

I also collected all of the clay soil that I dug out for the foundations. I'll use it to make the bricks so none of it goes to waste.

Also just a quick note. Yes I know it looks like some of the trenches are crooked but, the bricks that I'm using are only 4 inches wide and the trenches are at least 6 inches wide so there is no issue.

Brick Estimation For Foundation Bricks

Well I'm at the point of needing to make the stabilized lime bricks so I can begin building the foundations. I'll use standard adobe bricks on top of the stabilized lime brick foundation. Now comes the part of my frustration. How to estimate the number of bricks that I'll need to make for the foundations. Well I naturally went online looking for a calculator to use. Man was that a frustrating waste of time. All I could find was calculators for bricks of set sizes like red brick or people just saying this is how any you should estimate.

So I decided to put together a spreadsheet that would allow me to enter all of the information to be able to estimate just how many bricks I would need. I'll make the form available for free to anyone that wants to use it. I hope it will help.

It's a very simple and plain form as you can see in the picture but, it works very fast to give you a pretty solid estimate. This form is designed to work with any custom sized bricks. Since we tend to make adobe bricks based on the size we need I thought it was important to make the custom size available in this form.

So what I came up with was needing an estimated 614 bricks. So how did I come up with that? I measured the exposed length of each side in inches. Then I added all of them together to get the total length. I then added the length of the brick at 10.5 inches plus the end joint of 0.5 inches giving me 11 inches. I took the total length of 1661 inches and divided that by 11 inches. I figured that at my deepest point I would need a minimum of 12 inches of foundation. This rounds up to 14 inches for 4 rows of bricks. So I took 1661 bricks divided that by the 11 inches and multiplied that by the 4 rows. I also factored in a few extra bricks in by figuring 5 bricks multiplied the number of rows and then divided in half giving me 10 extra bricks. This gave me a total number of bricks of 614. I also rounded up all the number of bricks so that I would have a few extra rather than not enough since a bricks sometimes break.

I am making the brick estimation form available for download for anyone who might find it useful. I saved the spreadsheet form in 2 formats to make it easier for people to use. The first format is .ods from LibreOffice Calc and the second format is .xls from Microsoft Excel. I used the older Excel version to try and make it more compatible.

Brick Estimation Form.ods

Brick Estimation Form.xls

{These links have now been deactivated. A new enhanced version of this form has now been posted. Please check the post dated April 3rd, 2013 for the links to the updated version 2 of the Brick Estimation Form.}

I have tested both of these spreadsheet forms with Google Sheets as well and they both work. I hope this form makes it a little easier for any brick project that you may have.

Please also take into consideration if you plan to build your wall a brick and a half thick, 2 bricks thick or more and adjust the wall thickness on the form to get the correct estimate. Also keep in mind that this form is designed for walls and not solid filled in spaces such as the hearth of a fireplace or base of an oven. To get a better estimate some changes in the calculations would need to be made.

Also please keep in mind that this form is for estimation purposes and that every design is unique. This brick estimation form has not been designed to estimate circles or domes but, that option could be added if needed later.

Don't Mess With Mother Nature

What a picture! I definitely think that the title of the post says it all. I had planned on laying up some bricks and working in the yard today but, as you can see mother nature had her own ideas. So I will have to wait this weather out before I can get back to making bricks. Hopefully this will be the last storm for a while so I can have the time to get the bricks made.

For those of you who live in other places this picture is proof that even in the low desert it does get cold. I took this picture at just after 1 PM MST. Yesterday it was almost 80 F at this time and today it's only 57 F and dropping. Yes by the way, that is hail failing from the sky and bouncing off of the oven. It's been raining on and off all day but, right now the thunder is rolling and hail is coming down with some extreme force. Ya, I'm not going out in that if I don't have to. We've got winds of around 20 MPH as well. So I'm staying inside today and will probably wait for 1 or 2 days for everything to calm down and dry out before I go back to making bricks. I'll post more then. I hope everyone else out there comes through this storm with little to no problems.


Follow up to the first half of the post.

By 3 PM the temperature has fallen the 46 F and we're having wind gusts hitting about 50 MPH and the ground was so saturated that we have small lakes 3 to 4 inches deep in places. The winds again ripped off more shingles from the the roof. So I'll have to replace the missing and damaged shingles after the storm clears. The yard is a mess with debris blown all over. So there's a lot to clean up. So it may be several days before I get back to making bricks and doing more work on the outdoor kitchen.

You know, besides all of the storm damage and debris what really ticks me off about this storm is that it knocked all of the flowers off of both of the nectarine trees and the apple tree that had just started to bloom earlier this week. So that means we may not get much fruit from them this year. Dang, I was really looking forward to the fruit this summer. Like I said in the title, don't mess with mother nature.

It's weather like this that makes us need a roof to protect the adobe and cob that I'm using to build the kitchen. Without a roof with this much rain it the kitchen wouldn't last very long. This is why I am planning a roof. If you are building a kitchen of you own I would highly recommend a roof for you too. Keeps shade in the heat and keeps the rain off making your kitchen usable most of the year and make it last for years to come.

Sand, Sand And More Sand

Wow what a day! As you can see in the picture I just finished unloading sand. This was my second trip to the wash. I want to make a comment about the weight of sand. I know we don't think about it much but, sands weighs a lot. I borrowed my friend's truck this time to get the sand so I didn't have to make a bunch of trips. A big word of cation here, pay attention to the truck tires! I didn't know that the air pressure in the tires was low. So I got less than half of the truck bed loaded with sand and then noticed the tires were flattening. Oh that's bad! So I very quickly stopped loading the truck with sand and then slowly drove the truck home. After I emptied out the first load I checked and added air to all of the tires.  Then I went back and got a second load of sand. This time I filled the truck bed about 2/3 full, just to be safe. The truck drove much better and handled the load of sand much better with the extra air in the tires. So just remember to check your tires before you go down and start filling up the bed of your truck.

I am going to start laying up my foundation bricks and then more adobe for the rest of the counters. I have more clay earth in my yard than I could ever know what to do with but, sand is a different story. So I go down to the closest wash and get my sand. For those of you wondering if this is legal I called both the county and ADOT to ask if I could collect the sand. I was told that as long as it wasn't put there for use by the county or ADOT and it was on the side of the road then yes it was legal to collect.

Since the local wash flooded really bad over the winter it placed large amounts of clay and sand on the roadway. That sand and clay was then scraped off of the road and just placed on the side of the road. When I say large amounts I'm talking about piles 4 feet high for about 60 feet on either side of the road. For making adobe bricks this is a gold mine. I think I could build an entire house with the sand sitting on the side of the road. Just to put it in perspective for you, the picture of the pile of sand was dug out of a section of 1 pile. I dug a hole into the pile about 5 feet wide and less than halfway through the pile.

So with that I figure I should have access to plenty of sand. With that in mind my next step is to begin making the foundation bricks. My foundation bricks will be the standard adobe brick clay, sand and straw mix but, I will also include some slacked lime in the mix. By adding the lime, clay and sand together that is the recipe for the classic Roman cement. I'll be adding the chopped straw for additional strength in the bricks. This will work well as a foundation and be water proof. I used the same type of bricks as the foundation bricks for the outside wall of the base for the large oven. They have held up and worked great. As I already mentioned before I will use red brick for the entryway and step so as to protect the floor from wear or damage on the corners.

I want to point out that the mortar that I will be using for the red bricks and the lime stabilized bricks will be a clay, sand and lime mix. This will allow all of the bricks to bond well. I will switch to the standard clay and sand mix for all of the other bricks.

Now I need to measure the perimeter so I can figure out how many lime stabilized bricks I'll need, then it's time to begin making bricks.

Moving On To The Next Step

Well I figured out the locations the water lines and drain line. Yes I said drain line. I have decided to omit the second sink. Why you say? Well as I stood and looked at the staked out layout of the kitchen I had a realization. Why do I need 2 sinks outside? I have a sink inside the house and a sink outside should be just fine. So with that thought in mind I nixed the second sink. I am however going to add a hose valve spigot on the outside of the wall of the corner counter on the right side instead of the sink. I will also be running a water line and adding another hose valve spigot in the area between the smokehouse and the hot tub.

You can see in the picture that I've laid out where all of the water lines and drain lines will go in red. I haven't dug them deep at all because I only need the trenches dug down just deep enough so that the drain can maintain a descending angle of 1/4 inch over 4 feet. Our frost line is very shallow here. I have some irrigation lines in my hard that are in places only a couple of inches deep and they have never frozen. Now if you are building in a colder area and you are using water lines make sure to insulate them and install them below the frost line. The last thing you would want is to have a water line freeze and burst underneath you floor.

My plan is to add a tee (T) to the drain pipe under the sink in the inside kitchen from the sink in the outdoor kitchen. That way I can use the same drain pipe without having to add more. If you were building a kitchen in an open area or an area away from any drains I would think that you could treat the water from the sink as grey water and run your drain to trees, bushes or other plants that you anted to water. If you do that just keep in mind not to put anything down the drain that would hurt the plants.

I have also spent time at my local home improvement store and I have decided to use PEX tubing for the hot and cold water. I can buy the tubing in roles of 100 feet for about $27.00 US as opposed to about $20.00 US for 10 feet of copper tubing. Since keeping costs down to a minimum is part of my focus I decided that the PEX tubing is the most economical option. I will admit however that I would prefer copper and that I would use it if I had the extra money. For the money the best option does seem to be PEX tubing and since it is rated for both indoor and in ground that should work. One word of caution about PEX tubing. It is sensitive to UV (Ultraviolet Light) light. So you can't use the PEX tubing in a place where it would be exposed to sunlight. So you run the PEX tubing inside walls, under your house, under the kitchen floor in the ground or even up inside the counters but, you have to attach and convert to a solid pipe, like a short piece of copper, that can be exposed to sunlight and the elements anywhere you want to have a hose valve spigot or any other exposed fixture or connection.

I have seen other people use PVC, CPVC, steel pipe, and even the black poly irrigation pipe. You can use whatever you want and whatever is available to you. For reasons of cost and availability I chose to go with the PEX tubing but, you can choose anything that works for you.

The Layout

Well I finished clearing out the kitchen space as I had posted and then started figuring out my layout for the kitchen. Man was that a pain! As it turned out my digitally measured layout file was originally done with Microsoft Visio software. Well here's the rub, when my computer crashed the last time while I was running Windows and I had had enough. So I decided to completely convert over to Linux and I've been running Ubuntu Linux ever since. However it turns out that all of the information and measurements stored in the Visio file is now no good to me since I can't find a Linux application that reads my Visio file.

So in order to get any usable measurements I printed out the kitchen plan layout images that I have on the blog, got my tape measures and pulled out my old drafting tools. I took some reference measurements from the house to the large oven. Then used the architectural rulers to determine the measurement units to use on the printout so that I could convert it to inches and feet to use on the ground. This was a pain since the scale of the printout wasn't exact anymore because, when I printed it my printer automatically scaled the image up to the size of the paper. So I had to some estimating to do as well. I figured what the heck, it's my kitchen so I can make adjustments.

You can see my rough layout in the picture. I left a 4 foot walkway between the fireplace and corner counter to make it nice and easy to walk through. I also left 4 feet between the island and the house for the same reason. I left 3 feet between the right side of the island and the fireplace/counter and 5 feet between the back of the island and the barbecue/ wood stoves. I wanted enough room for 2 people to be able to walk around in the cooking area. It's hard to see in the picture but, I also marked the space for a 1 foot front overhang for a cantilevered counter top bar on the island.

In this picture you can see where the level of the house foundation is. This is going to be the same height of the floor of the kitchen all the way back to the last wood stove. I'm going to put a step in there to lower the floor level for the large wood oven and smoke house. Since I'm going to build up I won't need to dig much for foundations as the floor will act as one large foundation. The front exposed side will have a small foundation of lime stabilized adobe bricks to provide water protection to the outdoor kitchen and floor. Thankfully when it rains here only the top few inches get soft so 1 or maybe 2 layers of the lime stabilized adobe bricks would be the minimum. I'll probably go with 3 layers of the lime stabilized adobe bricks just to be on the safe side, maybe.

For the front entrance way and for the step down by the wood stove I plan on using some recycled red bricks. I figured by using these it would protect the floor since the red bricks would take the brunt of the foot traffic on the edges of the 2 step downs. Since I happen to have a lot of red brick to recycle I figured this would be a good use.

Just a quick note about the red bricks. A friend and I took his truck out to the desert looking for some rocks to line his driveway with. However what we found was a pile of red bricks that someone had pulled up from a patio and just taken out to the desert and dumped. We loaded up his truck bed with all of the brick. There was so much that we completely filled a standard 4 foot by 8 foot truck bed. I found the urbanite (broken up pieces of concrete used as large flat stones) for the base of the large oven the same way. Just going out to the desert and finding the stuff that other people just took out and dumped. I've been told by other people that they've found cinder blocks taken out and dumped as well. So you never know what you'll find if you go look. I figure I saved about $400.00 US by salvaging all that red brick. I can deal with that. If you plan on building something like this my suggestion would be to keep an eye out. I figure that anytime you can save money, clean up the environment, reuse materials and get something very usable out of it is the ultimate in green building.

I still have to move out the old hot tub to layout the smokehouse and figure out what the level the lower floor is going to be. I'm also planning on running arches around the outside of the kitchen as support for the roof over the kitchen and ht tub area. I figure the arched walls will also function as a partial wind block. In the summer time here in Arizona that is huge when we get the monsoons and sandstorms. It would make the outdoor kitchen even more usable during the summer and provide some privacy screening which I know my wife would like.

So that's where I'm at so far and what my plans are. I'll post more soon.

Clearing Out The Kitchen Space Update

So just a quick update on my clean up progress. You can see in the picture to the left that I got all of the stuff moved as well as all of the pavers. I have to say that it took more than I realized to move everything.

I spent the 2 days moving and hauling stuff to clear it all away but the worst part was pulling up the pavers. Wow, first off I didn't realize how much the ground under the pavers would act as a glue. Man were those pavers stuck down. It took a lot of force to pull them up. I also forgot just how heavy those pavers are, especially when they are stacked up. Thank god for heavy duty dollies!

The only issue that I'm worried about is that the hot tub will have to be moved. I think it may be too close to the oven to fit the smokehouse in between. I guess that's ok because the hot tub next to the house is going to be replaced with the one you can see in the distance in the picture anyways. Next I'll start measuring everything out and begin laying things out with stakes and strings.

Another Design Change

Ok I know that I just made a design change in the last post but, as I've been working outside and thinking about things I decided another design change was called for.

As you can see in this layout picture both sinks are separated and far away from any of the heat sources. Because of this little design flaw I decided that trying to include copper piping into the build to heat the hot water isn't going to be very doable for me.

I did some quick measurements and realized I would need about 70 feet of copper pipe and drain pipe just to run hot and cold water to both sinks. If I were to also add the copper pipes within the build around the oven, stoves and fireplace as I had originally planned I figured out that I would need about another 200 feet of copper pipe.

Well that was a bit of a shock to me. I had never figured that it was going to take so much copper pipe to do this. The sad thing here is that it's cheaper to add two small 110 Volt instant water heaters, one under each sink, than it is to buy all of the pipe.

So after looking at all of my options I have decided to omit the extra copper water pipe from my design. I've decide that I'm only going to use enough pipe to run the water to the sinks. In the future after I've built the outdoor kitchen I may add an instant water heater to the sinks. If I were to have a different space to build another kitchen I would likely try and design it so the sink and heat source were adjacent.  That way I could use the excess heat to heat the water as I had originally planned.

Small Design Change

Since my last post I've been slowly working on cleaning up and clearing out all of the stuff that is in my way. While I was working on cleaning up all of the stuff I had a thought, "Why not build my smoker here in the outdoor kitchen instead of further back in my yard like I was originally planning?".

See my original plan was to build an adobe brick smokehouse in the back of my yard. I never really thought about it putting it anywhere else. I have no idea why I didn't but, it suddenly made perfect sense to put the smokehouse with the rest of the outdoor kitchen.

So after thinking about I decided that placing the smoker next to the large oven would be best. You can see in the picture above where I added the smoker.

I plan on using the space between the large wood oven and the body of the smokehouse to build two fireboxes. One firebox will be built right into the bottom of the smokehouse to be used for hot smoking. The second firebox will be built away from the smokehouse to be used for cold smoking.

I figure that by placing the smokehouse in the outdoor kitchen it makes it more accessible and usable. Plus I have plans on using the smokehouse regularly so this will make it much more convenient. Plus having access to both the outdoor kitchen and the indoor kitchen so close should help greatly.

So my next step is to finish clearing the last of the stuff in my way and remove all of the pavers that we had previously put down. Then I can make work on stakes and strings to mark everything out for the final layout before I start digging trenches for electrical and plumbing.

The Weathering Of The Oven And Whitewash

First off let me say that since I applied the original whitewash in August and September of 2011 we have had some very unusually wet, cold and windy weather. Over the last 18 months we had wind storms with wind speeds measured up to 125 miles an hour, we've set cold temperature records and even set some rainfall records. Basically our weather has been much different and harsher than we've been used to.

I'm making a special point about the weather we've had and the time period because, the weekend following my post "Lessons In Lime" on June 11, 2012 is when I reinjured my back and hip. So I never had a chance to apply the lime stucco as I had planned. That means the only whitewash that was on the oven was the original coats from August and September of 2011 and the added coat in March 2012.

You can see that there is still whitewash on the oven. Surprisingly it actually has lasted and the areas where the whitewash bonded well is still protected well. I tried to use some tarps over the last 18 months to help protect the oven from the weather but, I'm not sure how much good the tarps are doing. Everywhere the tarps were in contact with the whitewash is where the whitewash is gone. There was also other physical damage caused by the tarps flapping and hitting the oven. Also there was damage from the cords, wood and blocks that we used to hold down the tarps.

There was also some cracking on the dome and chimney but, I know that 99% of that was from heat expansion. We've have been using this oven regularly over the last 18 months and at one point we really put it through it's paces. We decided to really stoke the oven. Wow did it get hot!

Ok, so here is where the guy thing comes in. We wanted to see just how hot it was. Now I know that the carbon is burnt off at about 900 F and there was absolutely no carbon in the oven. So we already knew that we were over that. So I had the bright idea to try and place a glass bottle in the oven to see if it would melt. I know that glass softens at about 1700 F to 1900 F and melts at about 2600 F to 2900 F. I figured I could use the bottle as a rough temperature estimate. Well that worked but, the bottle melted. It didn't just soften and slump down, I mean it melted and puddled. I used a poker to try to move it and it was glowing red hot, soft and even sticky. It wanted to stick to the end of the poker and stretch. So I know that the oven got really hot from that and I saw some of the cracks develop that night. On the plus side I can say that it took over 48 hours for the oven to cool down. The oven held the heat amazingly well. Truthfully this little experiment really showed just how hot this oven can get and how well it can hold heat. The downside of the experiment were the expansion cracks on the dome. The cracks are easy to fix though.

The most amount of damage was caused by the water running off of the counter. It seems that when the water would run over the edge of the tile it would get pulled to the wall by the surface tension and undercut the tile edged. Truthfully this  is the most amount of damage on the entire oven. The oven looks worse than it really is from all of the whitewash being flaked off.

Overall I have to say that the oven has weathered very well over the last 18 months. Even with all of the freak, unusual and extreme weather that we have had during this time. I am planning on adding the lime stucco to the oven and a roof covering. Hopefully I can get both done this year. Based on the last 18 months if I did nothing to the oven and just left it as is, I could get several worry free years of use out of it. However after that it would need lots of work. With just a coating or two of whitewash a year I really think the life of the oven could be extended for many years. The same would hold true for the lime stucco coating. This oven if maintained could last for as long as I do, which is what I am planning on.

Clearing Out The Kitchen Space

Well Like I said in my last post, I have a lot of work to do to clear out the kitchen space to get started on the rest of the kitchen. If you're anything like me you have so many things going on all at once there just never seems to be enough time in the day to get to everything. Add to that trying to deal with my injuries and sometimes it just takes me way to long to get to things. For those of you that have teenagers you also know what it's like to try and get things completed. As my father and grandfather used to say, it's like pulling hen's teeth.

As you can see in the picture above I have lots of stuff that needs to be cleaned up and taken care of before I can even start laying things out for the rest of the kitchen. It's also very hard to see in the picture but, there is pavers laid down to make a patio that is about 20 feet by 25 feet. The fun part of removing the pavers is that we laid them directly into the slightly wet soil and they are held down and as solid as concrete. I may have to soak them with water just to get them to release since our soil here dries so hard.

When I get all of this moved out and cleared I'll start the laying everything. Once I get all of the layout done I'll be able to get a rough estimate of how many bricks I'll need to make as well. I'll also layout the trenches for the plumbing and electrical that I want to put in.

I'll post pictures as soon as I get things cleared and when things are laid out.

I'm including this just to show that things happen in life and no matter how bad things look right now you can always make something good out of it, as long as you're willing to do the work.

Back Again... And Again

Well since my last post I haven't quite been able to do what I planned. I had another relapse of this dang flu virus again. I know the doctors have said it could takes as much as 18 weeks to get over this virus but, I really didn't expect it to be that bad. Boy have I been wrong. I hope that I'm finally over it now. Unfortunately we also had another one of our dogs pass away as well. We think she had come down with the same virus that the rest of us had and she just didn't make it. She was a good dog and we'll miss her. We've suffered a lot of loss over the last few months and that's made it hard. We've also had more unusually cold weather and some freak storms since my last post. All of this together has kept me from doing much on the kitchen project.

So my plan is to try and finish the kitchen this year. My yard and kitchen space is somewhat of a mess and has a lot of work to do to the space to build the kitchen. So my plan is to get some pictures of the area as it is now and as we're working. Once the area is clear I'll use strings to lay out the counters and the foundations for them. I'm also going to have to run some plumbing and electrical as well so I'll mark where to trench for those too. I'll try to keep posting my progress with pictures regularly.

I hope the cold weather is behind us so I can work more outdoors without getting sick anymore. I really want to get my kitchen done this year so that I can use it over the summer. I had never expected for this project to take so long but, life gets in the way of our best laid plans. All I can do is to keep plugging away at it and eventually make it a reality. So with that in mind I'll end this post but, with more to come soon.

Back Again

First off let me say hello again. In my last post I talked about my plans to work on the doing the lime stucco over the summer. Well you know how life gets in the way of your best laid plans? This is definitely what I experienced this past 6 months. My boys and I were helping a friend do some landscaping work in his backyard and I ended up re-injuring my back, hip and leg. Plus we had an extremely hot and wet summer. We also set an all time cold record over the winter. (You know something is wrong when New York is hotter than Phoenix in the dead of winter.) On top of all of that my family and I have been fighting the new flu strains for about the last month. Fortunately we all seem to finally be getting over the flu. Also over the last 6 months we have also lost one of our dogs, my grandmother, my step grandmother, a friend and our son's girlfriend. This has been a very hard time for us. So it's taken me quite a while to get back to my projects. Thanks to all of you for understanding the delay.

Before writing this post I looked up the statistics of this blog and I was truly surprised. There have been over 1,200 people from all over the world who have been visiting this site. I was shocked! I know that when I was searching for information before I started I had a lot of problems finding a good full range of information, which is why I started this blog. However, I never expected this much interest in this information. I honestly figured that there would be a few people like me interested in this information and my experiences but, in my wildest dreams I never expected this much interest or that the interest would come from all over the world. I was shocked and thrilled when I saw those statistics. So thank you to all of you who have read my blog and I truly hope that in some way I have helped, answered a question or maybe inspired you to give building something like this a try. 

Now that I have recovered more and can do more again, I plan on working on more projects again and since I now know so many people do have interest in what I'm doing I will continue to document my progress. I will also make it a point to not leave such a large gap of time in my posts.

Thanks again to all of you who have read this blog and I hope that if my blog has inspired you to build something or post a blog of your own that you will tell me in comment or send me a message so that I can add your information on my so that it may help other people find your blog and read about your experiences as well.