Towards development and expanding of mudbrick building construction

Abstract

Mudbrick construction and the search for rational use of ubiquitous soils from ancient times to the present are promising trends in solving modern problems of energy- and resource­saving and ecology. The article analyzes the world experience of mudbrick construction from the Neolithic era to the present day and describes individual ways for improving the physical and technical properties of soil materials. It is shown that in connection with the tightening of requirements for resource and energy saving, environmental safety of production and use of building materials, in many countries of the world there is an increasing interest in clay raw materials as their less energy­intensive varieties. Clay-based materials have found and are used in buildings and structures in the form of: monolithic clay-concrete walls, partitions and domes; monolithic elements of layered walls and partitions with cladding with weather-, water-, wear-, shock-resistant materials; raw clay bricks and blocks for laying walls, partitions, furnaces and domes; masonry and plaster mortars; paint compositions. The disadvantages and advantages of clays and materials based on them; additives that improve the physical, technical and operational properties of materials based on soils; painting compositions of clay-concrete products and clay finishing coatings are considered. The individual examples of world experience given in the article are a valuable illustration of the possibilities for the development and expansion of adobe construction, which can be realized in the construction of buildings and structures, both for agricultural purposes and in civil, industrial and residential construction.