Volcanic Rock Quarrying

I think you forgot unbelievably expensive.

Good luck CALIXMEUS,

Any thing can be done given the time and money. I think I would do it a little (or a lot) differently. How about setting up some Ocam's razor saws for the virticle cuts? If you want to know more let me know.

Rajdarbhangi has the jist of it hwen he says I should rename the project 'volcanic rock sculpturing' instead

You see, the whole point of the project is to see the feasability of holowing out - floor by floor - these city blocks, leaving the apropiate collumns so sustain the structure, with the aditional advantage of selling the surplus material.

the frontal cutts I see no problem in using saws, however, how do we get around to cutting the back face to the material to be extracted ?

What I was considering was to srart the cutts around each corner leaving a one meter collumn and using those cutts as reference points of intrusion to allign the back cuts of the rest of the blocks to be remooved between collumns, leaving each floor and respective collumns as true 'monolithic' structures

Using the saws on the streets and avenues to be cutt from the rooftops down to the botom floor poses no problem and we could work each floor at each level as we go down. Also there is the feasability of leaving diferent street levels intact from block to block for aditional structural strength between these, making the whole area one huge monolithic structure.

In the end, the question is this: Is it cheaper to build a cement and rebar building in places where this material has to be inported at tremendous costs (hawaii for exsample) as opposed to using the indigenous material in this fashion (remembering of course that the material extracted could help pay for these costs).

I believe it would probably still be more expensive to hollow out structures in the rock formation than importing cement and steel. Wouldn't it be cheaper to cut blocks from the rock and mortar the blocks together like masonry or brick structures.

true, your sugestion is the most obvious way to doo this... to a sertain extent, because you would still have to pour each floor and seiling and finish it all of with rebar..... remember, most volcanic areas are also seismic

You would need reinforcement anyways, as the brittle rock structure would be susceptible to fracture and abrupt critical failure from seismic events, or you could tryi to design everyroom such that a fracture along any sides would still allow the floors and roof to support themselves as cantilevers on support columns at only one side (you would still need to reinforce the floor to column connection to trasfer the load with out shearing).

That's correct... we would design the seiling to floor in what we in mexico refer to as a 'half point' dome construction which _ when aded to the exsact patern on the floor below - gives the upper column a three to one mas proportion to transfer the load.

We own a 480 year old hacienda here in mexico with three stories built out of brick and stone in this fashion and has stood up to all the elements very well as you can see in our web: www.hacienda-sangabriel.com.mx and this fact inspires us to look into the venture we have been discussing. Granted I probaby would not take the construction anny higher than three stories; unless the joint, multilevel streets could give enough lateral coehisiveness between structures

Also, might consider that andesite deposits will not be homogeneous or contiguous through out. Rock density, crystalline structure and minerology will change, and on larger scale there will be fractures and voids that can be quite large and extend for long distances and/or depths. Some fractures and planes of weakness might be too small to be readily identified upon visual inspection.

Again, your asesment is correct and it wil be a chalenge as to how to adopt to the sircumstances at hand. This means that we will try to work creativeley with every problem we face, and, of course keep all options open as to how to flow with the chalenge..... a VERY ergonomic plan.... still, the fact that all cuts can, an will be, sold or put to other constructions will help finatially to 'landscape' the structures as we go

Far from being an 'imposible situation' it sounds more exiting every day... thanks for the imput and it goes without saying everyone with anny experience in this would be welcome to join in the venture... the bigger the better

Better you should name this project VOLCANIC ROCK SCULPTURING than VOLCANIC ROCK QUARRYING because there is no comparision in normal quarrying and this project as far as expenditure is concerned. Initial thought process is in right direction with water jet cutting but with that only you cannot bring your dream project to reality; it will need a lot of chiselling after that. Regarding water jet cutting you need to do some feasibility study with source of water , availability, recycling of the same; laws regarding use of natural resources lke water etc.

You need some geological block assesser to identify the fault free blocks/ monoliths.

Good luck!

I have spent a good part of my carreer in stone quarrying but not in this type of projects.

Rajdarbhangi has the jist of it hwen he says I should rename the project 'volcanic rock sculpturing' instead

You see, the whole point of the project is to see the feasability of holowing out - floor by floor - these city blocks, leaving the apropiate collumns so sustain the structure, with the aditional advantage of selling the surplus material.

the frontal cutts I see no problem in using saws, however, how do we get around to cutting the back face to the material to be extracted ?

What I was considering was to srart the cutts around each corner leaving a one meter collumn and using those cutts as reference points of intrusion to allign the back cuts of the rest of the blocks to be remooved between collumns, leaving each floor and respective collumns as true 'monolithic' structures

Using the saws on the streets and avenues to be cutt from the rooftops down to the botom floor poses no problem and we could work each floor at each level as we go down. Also there is the feasability of leaving diferent street levels intact from block to block for aditional structural strength between these, making the whole area one huge monolithic structure.

In the end, the question is this: Is it cheaper to build a cement and rebar building in places where this material has to be inported at tremendous costs (hawaii for exsample) as opposed to using the indigenous material in this fashion (remembering of course that the material extracted could help pay for these costs).

04/15/2008 4:30 PM thread 20323

Hi Calixmeus,

you did ask the same question in thread 20323, so the same answers are valid.

I would expect your reasons to stick to water jet cutting?

This is neither suited to cut thick blocks nor suited to cut with a suitable velocity and has to use some added grinding "sand".

What are your objections against the possibilities I mentioned in that thread?

These are well proven and cost effective, the wire saw since more than 2000 years, the very big circular saw (5m diameter) since 25 years.

So why not?

Let an established company do it with established technology, this will save your money.

The problem with water-jet cutting with added grinding sand is the non straight cut going into any arbitrary direction a ta depth of 10cm and the inability to cut into massive material: only slabs are allowed!

RHABE

Rajdarbhangi has the jist of it hwen he says I should rename the project 'volcanic rock sculpturing' instead

You see, the whole point of the project is to see the feasability of holowing out - floor by floor - these city blocks, leaving the apropiate collumns so sustain the structure, with the aditional advantage of selling the surplus material.

the frontal cutts I see no problem in using saws, however, how do we get around to cutting the back face to the material to be extracted ?

What I was considering was to srart the cutts around each corner leaving a one meter collumn and using those cutts as reference points of intrusion to allign the back cuts of the rest of the blocks to be remooved between collumns, leaving each floor and respective collumns as true 'monolithic' structures

Using the saws on the streets and avenues to be cutt from the rooftops down to the botom floor poses no problem and we could work each floor at each level as we go down. Also there is the feasability of leaving diferent street levels intact from block to block for aditional structural strength between these, making the whole area one huge monolithic structure.

In the end, the question is this: Is it cheaper to build a cement and rebar building in places where this material has to be inported at tremendous costs (hawaii for exsample) as opposed to using the indigenous material in this fashion (remembering of course that the material extracted could help pay for these costs).