Making bricks with your own hands

One of the most common and oldest building materials is brick. Essentially, a brick is fake diamond, having a rectangular shape. This shape is much more convenient for construction than the natural stone, from which they built before. The widespread use of bricks in construction was facilitated by the widespread distribution of the main raw material - clay and its high consumer properties, that is: high mechanical strength, durability, resistance to water, fire, atmosphere, and solar radiation. The easiest way is to buy a brick. The variety of bricks produced is now very large. But brick prices will NOT pleasantly surprise you. Therefore, if you want to save money, then do it at home.

Let's consider all the technologies for making bricks at home in order.

Preparation of raw materials for making bricks

Brick is made from pure clays or from clays with the addition of non-plastic materials and burnable additives (sand, fireclay, sawdust, peat, husks, finely chopped straw, etc.). Non-plastic clays, for example, silt, can be used as additives.
The greater the ductility, the easier it is to make bricks. The easiest way to achieve plasticity in clay is to let it sit in a moist state. In a good way increasing the plasticity of clay is its freezing in winter.
To prepare clay for brick production, the harvested and crushed raw materials are placed in a container (like a trough) and soaked in water, adding it gradually in 2-3 additions, with periodic stirring, until the clay is completely soaked.

Do not allow clay with inclusions of pebbles and small stones, cleared from the plant layer of soil, into the process, and also do not allow clay with white inclusions (carbonates) in the form of large particles larger than 1 mm in size.
After soaking, the clay is left to sit for at least 3 days, or longer, by covering the trough with a damp cloth or plastic wrap.

After aging, the clay is checked for quality and suitability for molding, drying and firing. With normal working consistency, clay dough exhibits plastic and molding properties, retains its given shape without deformation and does not stick to hands or metal. As an example of an approximate determination of the quality of clay, the following can be given: clay is rolled up as thick as a finger and screwed onto a bottle. At the same time, it should not tear or have cracks, and also not smear throughout the bottle. The need for additives is determined by damage or cuts on the samples. These additives serve as a kind of strengthening “reinforcement”. Thus, up to 30% additives can be added to fatty clays.

For brick production It is better to take low-fat clays. Available additives include; river sand, sawdust, grain husks, peat chips, etc. Sand is used mainly to reduce the fat content of clay. The amount of sand added should not exceed 3 or 5%. Other fillers for brick bundles - no more than 20%. In this case, the particle size of additives is no more than 3-5 mm. The amount of additives is determined mainly by trial mixing and drying of raw samples.

It is advisable to test the fat content of the clay. This can be done different ways, here is the simplest of them.

To test clay for fat content, you will need 0.5 liters of extracted raw materials. You need to pour water into this clay and mix until the clay absorbs all the water and does not stick to your hands. From this mass, make a small ball, approximately 4-5 cm in diameter, and a cake with a diameter of about 10 cm. All this must be dried in the shade for 2-3 days.
After this, the cake and the ball are checked for strength. If there are cracks in them, then the clay is too oily and sand needs to be added to work with it. If there are no cracks, you need to throw the ball from a meter height. If it remains unharmed, this means that the clay is of normal fat content.
Excessively thin types of clay do not crack, but their strength leaves much to be desired, and therefore it is necessary to add clay of higher fat content to them. You need to mix clay or sand in small portions, in several stages, checking the quality of the composition after each mixing so as not to make a mistake and find the required proportions.

Previously cited detailed description making cinder blocks at home - for those who are interested in this topic.

Once the optimal proportions of the solution have been determined, it can be used to make bricks.

Molding

Brick molding is done manually by placing clay into wooden or metal molds and subsequent compaction.

Forms can be collapsible or non-collapsible. The inner surface of the mold must have smooth surface. A sketch of an approximate shape is shown in Fig. 1-a, 1-b. Before molding, the mold must be lubricated with oil, or whitewash (water with chalk), or simply moistened with water to prevent clay from sticking to the molds.

Metal mold for 1 brick

Wooden mold for 3 bricks

We must also remember that clay products decrease in size when dried and fired. This phenomenon is called air shrinkage - during drying and fire shrinkage - during firing. So, to mold an ordinary brick (250x120x65 mm), a mold of 260x130x75 mm is required.
You can make molds for several bricks at once in the form of a plate and then cut the plate into bricks the right size with a stretched string or metal tape moistened with water. The form can be with or without a bottom. The forms are installed on a clean, flat surface. Sawdust or a small amount of sand is poured into the bottom of the mold. The prepared clay is placed into molds with a shovel and then compacted. As the mold shrinks, clay mass is added until the edges of the mold are filled. Excess clay from the mold is cut off with a smooth wooden or metal strip.
Next, the cut surface is smoothed and the molds are removed. If the plate is molded, it is cut into bricks. Then let the raw brick “dry” and send it for drying. Withering lasts one hour or 2 hours and is determined by the absence of indentations from the fingers when it is lifted. Rejects from molding should be re-entered into production.

Usage hot water When preparing clay, it accelerates the drying of raw materials.
The raw molding process can be mechanized using the simplest screw press With manual drive or driven by any power plant (electric motor, engine internal combustion, wind or water engine). Such a press can be made in any mechanical workshop.

Drying bricks

When drying, it is necessary to ensure that moisture evaporates evenly both from the inside of the brick and from its surface. This is achieved by slow drying. Uneven drying causes warping and cracking of products. Correct drying is achieved mainly experimentally. The drying time can be reduced by reducing the initial moisture content of the raw brick, as well as by more thoroughly processing the mass and moistening it with hot water.
Drying of raw bricks usually takes place in drying sheds. For small volumes, if the weather permits, the raw material is dried in open areas. Term natural drying of raw brick varies, depending on climatic conditions, from 5 to 20 days.

The molded raw brick is placed in bags in 6-8 rows in height, with each row sprinkled with sand or sawdust. This brick is aged in a barn until the raw brick gains sufficient strength. As the bags dry, they are expanded with freshly molded raw material with a similar filling. The bottom row of raw bricks is often placed on a poke.
If we take into account that the top rows dry somewhat faster, the entire package will dry approximately at the same time. This operation will significantly increase the capacity of the drying areas, with approximately the same drying time. If the brick is kept in a barn, then drying is carried out for 3 days in indoors, and then in a ventilated room.
When choosing a drying site, it is necessary to ensure that the soil is not wet. It is better to lay it on the ground for these purposes. wooden shield or, as a last resort, fill the area with dry sand and make a drainage trench.

If drying is carried out outdoors, it is necessary to make a rain shelter over the drying area. The outside temperature during drying must be at least 10°C. After drying, the raw brick is sent for firing to produce brick.
The readiness of raw brick for firing will be determined by the following criteria: a brick taken from the middle rows is broken in half and if there is no dark spot in the middle (a sign of moisture), the raw material is considered suitable for firing.

Brick firing

Brick firing is carried out in homemade stoves , the device of which is not difficult. The shapes of the kilns, their structure, and the placement of raw bricks for firing are described below.

The quality of bricks during firing depends on: the time of temperature rise, the final firing temperature, the duration of holding the temperature reached, the nature of the gaseous environment and the cooling rate. At temperatures up to 150°C, drying of raw brick occurs. This creates significant amount water vapor, which, when the temperature rises rapidly, is released so quickly that it can rupture the product. Therefore, it is not recommended to sharply increase the temperature.

When installing a furnace, it is necessary to provide fire safety measures. From wooden buildings they must be no closer than 100 m. Level groundwater at the construction site should be below 2.5 m (in order to reduce heat loss).

Brick kilns can be round or rectangular. Variants of furnace shapes are shown in the figures below.

Round oven option. Sizes are arbitrary

A variant of a rectangular stove with several fireboxes. Oven dimensions are arbitrary

The furnace is constructed as follows: first, a foundation 60 cm wide and 50 cm deep is laid, then walls 50 cm thick are laid, decreasing after 2/3 of the furnace height to 25 cm. The inner part of the wall up to 2/3 of the furnace height must be vertical, then the wall may taper to form a chimney. The walls can be laid out either from baked bricks or from adobe on thin clay solution to make it easier to dismantle the walls after the stoves are no longer needed.

When laying walls, it is necessary to provide an opening for loading raw bricks, in which, after loading, a firebox is made. The firebox can be made both in front of the stove and inside it. If the width or diameter of the stove is more than two meters, then several fireboxes can be made, depending on the size of the stove.

The floor of the furnace, the so-called POD, is covered with dry clay chips or small crushed stone, a layer thickness of 10 cm. Loading the furnace, that is, setting bricks, is carried out as shown in Fig. 4. Loading the furnace with raw bricks begins in columns with a gap between the bricks, forming combustion channels during laying. Each channel is blocked with raw brick, leaving a gap.

The density of the charge per 1 cubic meter of the furnace (its internal part) is 220 or 240 pcs. ordinary brick measuring 250x120x65 mm. Towards the top, the density of the cage increases to 300 pieces. per 1 cubic meter

Set density is 220 - 240 bricks per 1 cubic meter. oven (its internal part). At the top, the density increases to 300 pcs.

Option for laying “legs” for high stoves

The first 4 rows are the “cage legs”. The laying of the raw material on the “legs” is carried out in a herringbone pattern. The upper rows are compacted

Option for laying raw material for firing

Lead the cage strictly adhering to the scheme. After 1.5 m, or 2/3 of the furnace height, the loading of raw materials is carried out simultaneously with the laying of the furnace walls. In this case, the masonry is narrowed with a slope of about 30°C. The higher the furnace, the more efficient its operation, since the heat of the flue gases in the upper part is used to dry the raw brick. For better draft, you can install a pipe on the stove. The oven is carefully covered with a thick layer of clay. The opening is sealed under the firebox. The firebox must have a well-fitting door or lid. Firewood is used for firing, but coal is more effective. It is possible to install nozzle burners operating on diesel fuel or fuel oil. For better combustion solid fuel It is advisable to install grate bars at a height of 20 cm, which need to be strengthened.

Fuel consumption per 1 thousand units. fired brick is 1.8-2.6 cubic meters or 100-140 kg of coal. Firing goes through several stages. First, the furnace is ignited and the temperature is maintained at 150-200°C to dry the raw brick for 2 days. The fuel is low-grade firewood. Then the fuel supply is increased, gradually raising the temperature to 850-1000°C, firing time is 3-4 days. The temperature can be observed visually. 850-1000°C - light yellow-orange color.

After complete firing, the cooling stage begins. Re-coat the cracks with clay. The firebox is laid with bricks and covered with clay, excluding air leaks. The cooling time is at least two days. After complete cooling, the kiln is opened, the bricks are selected and sorted. A well-fired brick should ring when struck with a hammer. Unfired or unfired bricks are again laid for firing or used for the foundation or interior walls in dry rooms.

When firing bricks and cooling the kiln, it is necessary to observe following rules security:

Firing and cooling of bricks must be under constant supervision and control;
- do not allow premature opening of the oven;
- do not allow inspection of the readiness of firing and cooling of the brick by climbing onto the stove;
- do not allow contact large mass water into a hot oven to avoid steam burns;
- laying of raw bricks for drying and fired bricks, when disembarking from the kiln, should only be carried out with an inclination towards the inside of the stack to avoid the stack falling.

For not large quantity homemade brick, you can use a simpler “oven” for firing bricks.

This can be done in a regular barrel with a volume of 200-250 liters. It is necessary to lay bricks in a barrel, leaving small gaps for uniform heating. You definitely need a pit for the fire, 40-50 cm deep. The bottom of the barrel is cut out and the barrel is placed on the fire on legs 20 cm high. This will make it more convenient to maintain and regulate the fire, and the heating of the mass of bricks will be uniform.

Now the barrel needs to be filled with bricks. They must be laid with small gaps, one on top of the other. Then, to prevent cold air from entering the barrel during firing, you need to close it metal sheet. A cut-out bottom can come in handy here; it will be especially convenient if handles are attached to it.

Now you need to stock up on fuel and patience. The process takes from 18 to 20 hours, during all this time, while the bricks are being fired, it is necessary to maintain the fire under the barrel. After this, the barrel should cool down. This should happen gradually, and the lid should not be opened. You need to regulate the temperature in stages, reducing the flame of the fire. Artificial way cooling is not suitable here; cooling must only be natural.

4-5 hours after the barrel and its contents have completely cooled, you can open the lid and remove the finished fired products.

Causes of brick defects during its manufacture and measures to eliminate them

	Type of defect	Reasons for education	Remedies
		I. Molding
1	Raw material has low strength and breaks without effort	Increased sandiness of clay or presence of inclusions	Adjust the composition of the mass, do not allow clay with inclusions into production
2	Raw material is easily deformed and easily sticks to your hands; timber is easily deformed	High humidity masses	Reduce the moisture content of the mass by introducing dry additives
3	The raw material exfoliates	Insufficient compaction of the clay mass in the mold	Increase force when compacting
4	"Raisins" - inclusions of unmixed lumps	The tire is poorly mixed, there is not enough water to soak the clay, there is not enough time for the mud to soak	It is better to mix the clay and the mixture. Add water to soak the clay, increase the soaking time of the mud and the curing of the mixture
5	Inclusions of grass, roots, large shavings, etc. are noticeable.	Clay is not cleared of impurities. Unsifted sawdust was used	Clear the mud. Sift sawdust
6	The dimensions of the raw material are larger or smaller than required	The charge has changed, the molds have worked together, the cut of the “top” on the molds is uneven. Increased humidity of the mass	Adjust the composition of the charge, replace the molds, evenly cut off excess mud from the molds, reduce the moisture content of the mass
		II. Drying
1	Large amount of raw material has cracks	The charge was selected incorrectly. High moisture content	Select and adjust the charge. Reduce clay moisture
2	Presence of deformed bricks	High humidity of the formed mass. The raw material is forced to dry	Adjust humidity. Place the raw material more carefully to dry
3	The raw material dries unevenly in height	A large number of bricks in height. Dense laying of bricks during drying	Reduce the number of bricks in height. “Discharge” the brick laying by drying
		III. Burning
1	The fire goes along the top of the stove, the lower rows of the cage are underburned	The charge is too discharged, which causes a drawback in the flow flue gases in its upper part, the fuel is incorrectly distributed by volume	Compact the top rows of the cage. Distribute the fuel evenly throughout the volume
2	The brick has many cracks	A sharp rise in temperature and large changes in temperature	Extend the firing mode, thin out the top rows of the charge
3	The brick has many notches	Rapid cooling of products, insufficient closure of fireboxes, cold air leaks through the fireboxes	Increase the cooling time of products. It's better to seal the fireboxes
4	Brick has reduced strength	Condensation of water vapor on raw material (steaming)	Reduce the humidity of the raw material entering the kiln, increase the drying time of the raw material before firing, increase the drying time of the brick in the kiln
5	When saturated with water, baked brick increases in volume and collapses	Presence of inclusions in the form of “duktik” - white inclusions	Switch to another clay or grind it more thoroughly, do not allow clay with white limestone inclusions into production
6	Overburning or underburning of bricks selected places by oven volume	Unevenness in the traction system, cold air leaks	The charge in the furnace volume is too dense or sparse, too big hole fireboxes Monitor the uniformity of fuel supply
7	The brick has chipped corners	Careless attitude towards raw materials in all operations	Handle products with care

The quality of the work done needs to be checked and for this purpose a small test of self-made bricks must be done.

Sacrifice one brick and break it with a construction hammer. If it is well fired, it will have the same color and the same structure throughout the entire fault. Now these fragments should be filled with water for several hours. After being in water, a well-fired brick should also have the same color and structure over its entire surface.

Brick has been used as a building material for a long time. This happened about a thousand years ago. Its first versions began to be produced from clay. In order to obtain an ordinary red brick, the clay mass will need to be fired at a temperature of more than a thousand degrees.

Most often, brick houses were made in areas where summers are quite hot. There was no need to use any ovens here, but you could simply trust the action of ultraviolet radiation. This brick will serve as an excellent building material for the construction of one-story buildings or any ancillary buildings.

Clay mining

The quality characteristics of the clay will depend on the area you live in. In this case, it will be located at a distance of several tens of centimeters from the surface. Clay is mined directly on their own sites, or you can use public deposits or special quarries.

To determine the presence of clay in the soil, you need to take a sample and add a little water. If it becomes a little oily, then there is a high probability of finding clay in this place.

How much high quality material you will produce - will depend on the fat content source material. This characteristic you can determine for yourself. To do this, you need to take half a kilogram of soil samples from different places on your site. Then mix it with water until the mixture starts to stick to your hands. From the resulting composition you need to make a ball with a diameter of five centimeters. Their number must be at least ten. This operation must be performed for each individual sample. After this, we leave the resulting balls to dry for several days.

For those samples that spread during the drying process, very oily clay was used. It is worth adding a little quartz sand to it. Those samples that remained intact are subjected to the next experiment. It needs to be dropped from a height of one meter and if it does not disintegrate, then this raw material is ideal for the production of bricks.

It should be noted that thin clays are not characterized by the presence of cracks, however, their strength is low. Therefore, to improve their quality, you should add a little earth. It is important to add sand and clay in several stages. In this case, the quality of the mixture will need to be checked regularly until we find the ideal proportion.

If there is no good deposit near your home, you can always purchase clay in special quarries.

What is raw brick?

In order to manufacture this type building material, three methods can be used:

Do not burn the brick and add straw or adobe to the mixture;
Do not burn raw materials (raw);
Ordinary red brick - by firing the material.

Adobe

The main thing in the production of this building material is to use only high-quality raw materials and dry them well. Only in this case is the adobe construction material will almost completely match the red brick.

If all rules and regulations are observed, adobe housing can serve you for more than seventy years. The walls must be made thick enough, because only then will this building be warm in the cold season and cool in the hot months.

To mix the adobe composition, you should prepare a special container. We combine two types of clay: lean and oily. Mix clay and straw in a ratio of 1:1:5. Also add some water and mix thoroughly with a shovel.

Brick molds should be prepared in advance. To do this, you can use boards or unnecessary pieces of plywood.

Before starting the process of obtaining the mixture, chop the straw well. Be very careful about this procedure, since the size of its pieces will affect the strength of the future solution. We recommend using wheat stalks.

After that, we do everything according to these instructions:

The thoroughly mixed solution must be poured into molds. To make the extraction process easier, the mold must be moistened with water or sprinkled with cement. It is important to compact the solution well. Cover with a lid. After some time, you need to remove it, turn the mold over and remove the product;
The following is the procedure for drying the brick. In this case, evaporation occurs excess moisture, which will change the original dimensions of the material. Further, the volume will not decrease, although the moisture has completely left. Therefore, you should continue the drying process under a canopy.

Bricks should be placed so that the sun does not hit them directly. Difficult to determine exact amount for drying, because it depends on climatic conditions and humidity.

The resulting material is not very resistant to moisture, so the walls outside the building require additional protection:

Make the roof overhangs at least sixty centimeters;
Bandage the masonry seams well;
Doors and windows must be at least one and a half meters from the corners;
When the walls are dry and settled, they need to be plastered.

In order to make a clay brick without adding straw, we do everything in the same way as adobe. We just replace the straw with sand in a ratio of one to five. It is best to use quartz sand the smallest fraction.

How to make baked brick?

You should know that firing bricks is a rather complex process. It is unlikely that you will be able to do this yourself at home. At the same time, it is rational to produce a small batch for production at home under original conditions.

Raw firing processes:

warming up;
direct firing;
cooling, which should occur gradually.

Home fired brick

Now let's take a closer look at each of these processes.

Burning

The simplest method of firing can be done in a metal barrel. Before this, both bottoms should be removed and placed on an iron stove without a top. This process can also take place over a fire. The bricks must be laid one on one, with a small distance between them. The barrel is covered with a metal lid. This will keep excess air from penetrating it.

In order to properly burn a brick, you will have to maintain the fire for twenty hours

The process ensures the evaporation of all unnecessary chemical compounds. This allows the clay to transition to a new state.

Cooling process

It is very important that the barrel filled with bricks cools in several stages. You must regulate this process yourself by reducing the degree of burning of the fire. The temperature drops slowly. When you reach six hundred and fifty degrees, you can accelerate. It will be possible to open it only after it has completely cooled down - this will happen in five to six hours.

Perhaps, how correctly the cooling process proceeds will be the most important point. This is due to the fact that with a sharp decrease in temperature hot material may crack. Therefore, the supply of cold air should be done gradually.

Video on making bricks

Next, you should carry out quality control of the resulting material. To do this, you need to break the finished material into two parts. Carefully examine the quality inside the brick, it should be uniform and uniform. These parts must be filled with water and left in this state for several hours. Color and quality should remain the same. Only such building material can be safely used to build a house.

At first glance, making bricks yourself seems like an unrealistic idea.

Filling out forms

Before filling the forms, they must be slightly moistened with inside water and sprinkle with fine dust or cement. This will make it easier to remove the workpieces. The clay dough is laid out in molds and shaken thoroughly so that the solution fills all the corners. Excess dough is removed with a metal plate. Then the top cover is applied and, after a short wait, it is removed. On the rack, turn the mold over and remove the workpiece.

Drying workpieces

This is not an easy and most responsible process. As the moisture evaporates, the particles in the workpiece are brought closer together by surface tension forces, and the volume of the brick decreases. Shrinkage has a certain limit - up to 15%. After which the volume reduction does not occur, although physically bound water does not yet have time to completely evaporate. For drying, it is best to use a rack with a canopy or under a canopy. It is important here that the brick blanks do not come under direct influence sun rays and at the same time well ventilated. The duration of drying depends on the temperature, humidity and mobility of the outside air and takes from 6 to 15 days under natural conditions. Making bricks without firing (raw brick) is ready.

Strengthening the water resistance of bricks

The water resistance of manufactured raw bricks is low, so walls made from it must be well protected from moisture. What can be done for this
undertake:

provide a length of roof overhang of at least 600 mm.,
carefully bandage the seams of the masonry,
window and door openings should be located no closer than 1.5 m from the corner,
after final drying, plaster the walls, line them with baked bricks or siding.

Now about making baked or ordinary red bricks. Firing raw bricks in order to obtain fired bricks is a complex technological process.
process, and its implementation at home is not very rational. However, small batches can be fired yourself for cladding a house.

Firing can be divided into 3 stages:

warming up,
actually, firing,
adjustable cooling.

Firing procedure at home

Warming up and firing

Raw brick firing can be carried out in a regular 200-250 liter iron barrel with cut out bottoms, placed on an iron stove without a top
or at the stake. When using a fire, it is better to place the fire pit in a hole 400-500 mm deep, and place the barrel on legs 200 mm high. – this will ensure more uniform heating, and it will become more convenient to maintain the fire. The bricks are laid one on top of the other with a small gap. After filling the barrel, it is covered with a metal shield to prevent the entry of cold air. The fire in the stove or fire is maintained for 18-20 hours. The firing mode is selected experimentally.

What happens to raw bricks during firing? During this period, hygroscopic (physically bound) and hydrate (chemically bound) water is removed from the fired brick, carbonates are partially decomposed, organic impurities are burned, and the entire mass placed in the barrel is evenly heated. In this case, clay minerals are destroyed, and the clay turns into an amorphous state. At a temperature of 800-1000 degrees for low-melting clays and at 1150-1200 degrees for refractory clays, the mass sinteres and a ceramic shard is formed.

Cooling

The loaded barrel with bricks should cool gradually, with the lids closed. Temperatures can be adjusted by reducing the fire of the fire or stove. The process of cooling bricks after firing is one of the most crucial moments. Freshly fired brick does not tolerate sudden changes in temperature and access to cold air. Allow this to happen and cracks will form. The temperature is reduced slowly, and only after bringing it to 650 degrees, the process
can be accelerated. The barrel is opened only after complete cooling - after 4-5 hours.

The work is completed and you can check the quality of the manufactured bricks. Split the cooled brick into two halves. Well-burnt brick on a fault has the same color and structure. Fill the debris with water and let it sit for several hours. Once wet, the fired brick should not be distinguished or destroyed.

The description is complete, the material may be useful to those who are interested in the following questions:
making bricks, brick making technology, brick making methods, making clay bricks, making bricks without firing.

Making a brick at home

Making bricks at home

Material kindly provided by the site: http://green-dom.info/building-your-own-house/brick-production-at-home-conditions/ We recommend!

From the author: Hello my dear readers. This time I want to tell you how to make a clay brick with your own hands. Many of you know that red brick is a high-quality building material, but it is not at all cheap. I’ll tell you a secret: you can quite simply make it yourself, without incurring any special costs.

Pottery production has long been considered a craft. The people who owned it provided the inhabitants with vessels for storing food, jugs for liquid and dry solids. Over time, artisans learned to produce from clay various items manufactures: tiles, dishes, etc. These items also included fireproof brick - a product that is used as a building material.

White brick is made from sand and lime, and red brick is made from clay. Brick made from clay has a number of advantages, such as environmental friendliness and resistance to various climatic conditions. It also has high strength/density, excellent wear resistance, etc. .

It is clear that a building material with such consumer properties is not cheap. . We’ll talk about how you can save money by making your own clay bricks.

In order to make a brick, you will need fatty and non-oily clay (clean), a small amount of burnable additives (sawdust, chopped straw), plywood, boards for molds, water and cement.

The tools you need are an ordinary shovel, a hacksaw, a construction sieve, a hammer, a mixing container and an iron strip (as an option - a construction trowel). Nothing fancy is required.

Preparation of raw materials

Prepare clean clay. Remember: the greater the plasticity of the clay, the easier it is to form a brick. There are many options for increasing the plasticity of clay. The simplest of them is to keep it wet.

To do this, take a container, fill it with crushed raw materials, previously cleared of small stones and lumps of grass. While stirring, add water little by little until the clay is completely soaked. Then leave the composition to age, covering the container with polyethylene, for 3-5 days.

After aging, check the resulting clay solution for suitability for further processing. It should come off easily from your hands and not change its given shape. Try rolling a piece finished material with a rope as thick as a pencil and wrap it around a thick stick. The mass should not blur or smear, tear or crumble. With this simple test you can determine whether you need supplements. If the clay crumbles, add water; if it spreads, add dry additives.

It is advisable to use low-fat clay, however, if there is no choice, you can reduce its fat content by adding sand, peat chips, sawdust or grain husks. The amount of additives varies from 3 to 15%, depending on the filler, and for the most accurate determination it is necessary to do test batches.

How to test clay for fat content yourself? There are many different ways, here is one of them:

Take 0.5 kg of clay and add water little by little, stirring occasionally. When the composition is sufficiently saturated with water, it will begin to stick to your hands. From the resulting material, make a cake the size of a small saucer and a ball the size of Walnut. Leave them to dry for several days.

Then extend your arm in front of you and throw the ball. As a result of the normal fat content of the clay, the ball will remain unharmed.

There are also too thin types of clay, characterized by poor quality and strength. To obtain high-quality composition From these types of material, you need to mix clay with a higher fat content to them, periodically adding it in small portions. To achieve the desired result, check the properties of the solution after each addition of clay.

Once you have determined the required proportions of the composition, you can begin molding the brick.

Brick molding

It is important that the inside of the molds used is smooth, without roughness or damage. Before use, treat their inner surface with water so that in the future you can easily remove the finished material.

The molding of the workpiece is carried out by placing the clay mass into molds and then compacting it.

Home-made brick making was practiced long before the construction of factories for their large-scale production. Even today, many thrifty owners prefer to make bricks with their own hands, instead of spending money on purchased products of similar quality. Hand-made building materials are sometimes even stronger than factory-made ones, and sometimes the construction of a shed or garage in the country does not require too strong products. In this article we will tell you how to make bricks with your own hands at home without the use of specialized equipment - machines, presses, etc.

Homemade bricks - highlights

The advantage of homemade bricks over those made in factories is not only their cheapness and efficiency. The most important thing is absolute environmental Safety building materials. You know exactly what the brick is made of, and you can control its physical and chemical characteristics at your discretion, making it stronger, lighter, more durable, warmer, etc.

Making bricks at home is not at all difficult, and methods for making them have been known for a very long time. In this case, you do not need special equipment or professional skills - everything happens in artisanal conditions. A combination of proven production methods, natural materials and new technical techniques allows for minimum costs get a quality product. Thus, various polymer additives and plasticizers can be added to the raw material for bricks to improve its thermal insulation qualities.

Construction of a new building at the dacha, be it sewer pit, fence, small barn or guest house, is not always associated with large financial costs. If you know the secret to making homemade bricks, you can save a significant amount and spend it on quality decoration, furniture, or a housewarming celebration!

What to make a brick from

By and large, brick is an artificially created stone. rectangular shape. Why rectangular? This one is for construction geometric shape is the most convenient - it can withstand prolonged loads, guarantees strength, stability, and rectangular building materials are easier to transport.

The most important thing when making homemade bricks is to find high-quality raw materials. To do this, you will need to find a deposit of good clay or purchase it at a base, factory, construction market, etc. The strength and durability of the products will depend on how pure the clay is and what inclusions are present in it. So if you find a clay deposit near your home, don’t rush to rejoice and fill bags with it - first check the quality.

Not all clay is suitable for bricks. So, you need to check its fat content level. To do this, take some clay and soak it with water until it starts to stick to your hands and you can sculpt with it. Make a small ball about 5 cm in diameter and a pancake 1 cm thick and 10 cm in diameter. Place items in the shade outdoors for 2-3 days.

Once they are dry, you can begin testing the strength. If cracks appear on the surface during drying, it means that the clay is too greasy and to prepare “brick dough” it should be diluted with fine river sand. If no cracks appear, throw the ball onto the asphalt from a height of 1 m without force - if it survives, then you have the ideal clay for making bricks.

If the brick making clay is too dry, it will not crack, but will be quite brittle. In this case, it must be diluted with a fattier composition. To prepare the solution, soak the clay with water and knead it thoroughly to achieve the consistency of very thick sour cream. Add to mixture if necessary river sand or fatty clay at the rate of 5 parts sand to 1 part clay. We must warn you that this is only an approximate proportion, since all clays have different compositions, and you may have to experiment to find your recipe for preparing the ideal solution.

As mentioned above, plasticizers and other additives can be mixed into homemade bricks that can improve the performance characteristics of the material. For example, in the old days small sawdust was added to the brick mass as insulation. And today it is becoming popular to make adobe bricks with straw. This “dough” is perfect not only for homemade bricks, but also for waterproofing and insulating foundations.

How to shape a brick

When the issue of materials has been resolved, you should take care of the shape of future products. In factories, a press is used to mold unbaked brick (raw brick); at home, it can easily be replaced by homemade molds in the form of rectangles made from boards or plywood. A do-it-yourself brick making press can come in handy if you are undertaking large-scale construction. But for small building or a fence, wooden blocks are enough.

A basic form for making bricks is made from thin boards, a couple of pieces of plywood and nails. To speed up the pace of production, it is recommended to make several blanks at once, otherwise you will have to wait until the composition dries to release the mold and begin pouring the next brick.

The dimensions of the form can be any depending on your needs and preferences, but it is better not to fantasize at first, but to make cells with dimensions classic brick– 250x120x65 mm. Build small conical projections on the mold lids at the top and bottom so that there are voids in the products to improve adhesion to the cement mortar.

Knock down a mold from boards, attach a plywood bottom, and leave the top lid loose so that it can be easily removed after filling the mold and removing the neatly formed brick.

How to make a brick - instructions

There are several types of brick depending on the specifics of creation: unfired brick or raw brick and fired brick - molded and then heat-treated in an oven. It is very easy to distinguish them - baked bricks have a rich red tint, while raw bricks remain faded brown, like dry clay. In terms of performance characteristics, these types are practically the same, although there is an opinion that fired brick is stronger. However, if the raw material is molded from high-quality clay and dried properly, it is in no way inferior in strength to a product processed in an oven.

Homemade bricks are suitable for the construction of small structures, for example, sheds, bathhouses, garages. Below we will look at the manufacturing process of both types of products.

Unfired brick

The technology for making raw bricks is quite simple, and anyone can handle it. If you wish, you can even involve children in the work, since the molding process is quite interesting and resembles sculpting Easter cakes in a sandbox.

How to make adobe brick:

Wet the inside of the wooden mold with cold water.
Sprinkle with clean, dry cement or regular fine dust so that the molded bricks can be easily removed and do not lose their shape.
Lay out clay mixture on the blanks and shake the mold thoroughly so that the “dough” fills all the corners.
Remove excess mortar with a piece of plywood or a wide spatula.
Close the mold with a removable lid.
Leave the mold in the shade for several days.
When the bricks are dry, remove the lid and leave the products to dry for another day.
Then turn the cells over, carefully shake out the molded products and leave to dry.

Such a homemade “machine” for making bricks will allow you to short time make high-quality building materials. To speed up the process, make several molds at once with many cells, but not too large so that they can be easily turned over.

Drying is the most important and responsible stage. During the process, the bricks shrink by about 15% and may crack if the technology is not followed. Under no circumstances expose the molds with the solution to the sun - this will in no way speed up the drying process, but will only damage the material. Also, do not leave the molds in the shade of a tree or house so that they do not get wet from rain or dew. It is best to place them under a shed or shed with good ventilation. Bricks can dry from a week to 16 days, depending on the dimensions, composition of the solution, temperature and air humidity.

Brick firing

How to make raw brick from clay is more or less clear. But if you need fired products, you should prepare for more labor-intensive work. Such a red brick may be needed if you need to fill a hole in a fence made of a similar material or build a small partition, make a mini-stove or barbecue on summer kitchen. That is, if we are talking about 30-50 bricks, but not about large-scale buildings.

Of course, if by chance you don’t have an industrial kiln on your property, then that’s a different matter. In all other cases you will have to improvise. In artisanal conditions, clay bricks are fired in ordinary large barrels with a volume of about 200 liters.

In a free area without vegetation and communications underground, dig a hole about 50 cm deep and with a diameter slightly less than the diameter of the bottom of the barrel. Cut small holes in the bottom of the container or remove the bottom altogether. Along the edges of the pit, place stones about 20 cm high, bricks or iron legs to place a barrel on them - this way you can maintain a fire in the pit and high temperature. Light a fire at the bottom of the pit, place a barrel and place raw materials inside. Lay the bricks with gaps and slightly offset so that they heat up evenly. Cover the barrel with an iron sheet to prevent cold air from entering.

The firing process itself is quite tedious and long. It is necessary to constantly maintain a high combustion temperature in the pit by adding firewood or coal for 18-20 hours. For this reason, it is better to start work in the early morning. After the specified period, allow the fire to burn out on its own and the barrel to cool completely.

Important: Do not put out the fire under any circumstances - a sudden change in temperature will lead to cracking of the baked clay.

After several hours, the barrel and all contents will cool down, and you can safely remove the finished baked bricks. But before installation, it is necessary to check the quality of the work performed. To do this you will have to sacrifice one brick. Break it with a construction sledgehammer and look at the break - in a well-fired brick, the color of the break is uniform and the same, without gradients or spots. The structure must also be uniform. Fill the debris with water for a couple of hours and see how the material behaves after soaking. A quality product must retain its structure and color.

In exactly the same way, you can make decorative bricks with your own hands for cladding a facade or fence, or decorating a stove inside a house. Beautiful colour baked brick will give the exterior comfort and completeness.