Thanks Mike, i would be happy to do that just terrible at typing plus when i write reports up for listed building work (doing two this week )
it takes me forever and because i'm a Celt i write lots of swear words cos it cheers me up :lol: then i have to censor the final draft otherwise i leave a few in ha ha,
At least it would give you some idea of how to do the job, better than the academic books which show pretty pics but waffle about how many microns per sq inch of grit is in the screed which i have had given to me as a formula to make screed jusy like they did in old days
rrr:
in the old days it was worse than now they (the old-time tilers) mixed screed with so much crap it is a joke that this prof got paid for sifting screed to come up with the formula i was supposed to use. I told him that it was complete BS.
And in fact in the screed we had found horse manure broken clay pipes dottle from those same pipes, wood shavings the list goes on they never stood and set up equal parts of anything they just mixed up and threw literally anything into the screed.
I have found coins in the stuff, we are more precise nowadays than our tile predecessors ever were, yes they did some brilliant work with rubbish lighting etc.
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Hi Steve, maybe we're related! :smilewinkgrin:
Isn't that the truth about the old mortar. We find all kinds of crap in the old mud beds that we demo. Never found any coins, but I've found pig hair (was mixed in with plaster), candy wrappers, cigarettes, liquor bottles, rocks, nails and so on. We also see in the mortar different layers that are composed of sand grains of different sizes, and it's clear that layer after layer was floated at different times. We tore out a floor last year and we could see four distinct layers, which I took to mean that they floated the mud in over four separate days.
You mentioned the Smithsonian having victorian floors-it's probably the original building, built in the mid 1800's, the one that is made of red sandstone? I need to go and see that soon and get some pics for everyone to see.
I'd love to hear more about your travels around the US and the places where you've worked.