Re: insulative ceramic bricks

["A.D. Karve" <adkarve@pn2.vsnl.net.in>]

Dear Dean,
when Ron was here two years ago, we discussed the matter of producing highly
porous bricks. Ron felt, that instead of going in for refractory material,
we can use porous bricks made from local clay for the firebox of a stove,
and that the air pockets in the terra cotta would insulate the firebox.  I
told him that extremely light and porous bricks were produced in our area in
the 13th century, and even today we refer to them (Bricks from Paithan float
on water) when we refer to a task requiring special knowledge and which
cannot be accomplished by a layman. Ron took from me the address of the
local archaeological museum in Pune, and although it was a holiday, he used
his charm to make the curator open the museum for him and show the bricks to
him. Nobody knows today, how these bricks were produced, but I suspect that
the brickmakers added large quantities of organic matter to the clay, so
that when the brick is burnt, the organic matter burnt away, leaving a
structure much like a loaf of bread. Unfortunately, in our group we do not
have anybody with knowledge of working with clay and ceramic material. So
although we want to try our hand at making porous terracotta that would
float on water, we have still not attempted it.
Yours A.D.Karve
-----Original Message-----
From: Dean Still <dstill@epud.net>
To: A.D. Karve <adkarve@pn2.vsnl.net.in>
Date: Wednesday, January 23, 2002 2:02 PM
Subject: insulative ceramic bricks


>Dear Dr. Karve,
>
>I hope that you are well. You may have heard that staff at Aprovecho have
>been working on developing insulative, refractory bricks for use in the
>combustion chamber of stoves. Engineering students at Dayton University are
>also working on formulating better bricks and I'm hopeful that we are
>getting closer to knowing how to help local brick makers to manufacture
>bricks especially made for stoves.
>
>I heard from Dr. Larson that you may have experience with making insulative
>ceramic mixtures and I was wondering whether you might be interested in the
>results from our studies as they occur? Perhaps you might steer us in the
>right directions?
>
>Best,
>
>Dean Still
>
>
>


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