Hydraform soil block house is now going up

As reported two weeks ago, Kenyans are now using stabilised soil blocks to build cheaper houses that use natural products. As seen on the photos here, their first house is underway and will be complete mid august.

Cost is mainly saved on wall cement. The blocks are interlocked and hence you dont use cement to join them. You also do not have to plaster the inner wall as these bricks are smooth and colourful. if you want to paint there is a special paint that you can use without plastering.

You save upto 40% of construction costs on materials. Labour is also saved as you take a shorter period to build.

In Kenya, the machines sold are mosty manual. You can get them from Makiga Engineering services likoni road telephone 550665. You can also check with Kickstart Kenya. However the Diesel Engine run machine from www.hydraform.com is much better than the manual ones and you can buy it from their factory straight from SA.

Here a group in Syokimau has the engine machine and is able to produce upto 1,500 blocks a day. They are ready to make blocks and sell for any size of a project. The project featured on my blog has blocks made by these guys. you can talk to the builder for more information on building costs...the builder is MaKiri builders.

Please join my blog as a member to follow discussions on this topic and many others that may interest you.

Construction in Kenya goes Green

The Construction industry in Kenya has finally gone green with the introduction of stabilized soil blocks building in Syokimau, Nairobi.

A group of young entreprenuers have acquired the latest machine from Hydaform SA and are now producing the stabilized soil blocks commercially. The machine makes 1,500 blocks everyday.

The first building project will take off this week and we will keep you updated on the progress. The house is a maisonette, on a 50*100 ft plot. Including a perimeter wall it is expected that 16,000 stabilized soil blocks will be used in this project. This technology is said lower the building costs by up to 40%.

Stabilized soil blocks interlock with each other removing the need to use cement on walls. which greatly reduces cost and promotes use of natural solutions in building.Depending on the colour of soil used, the final product can be in different colors creating a great aesthetic effect.

Photos and more information will be coming up soon!! meanwhile you can check out the link below for more information on this technology.



Link