Today was a great mileStone (forgive the pun).  We mixed concrete to fill in the block wall on our East end.

It all started with a mix of Portland Cement, sand, 3/8” gravel, and ground up polystyrene foam  (scraps from our forming material). This blend created a lightweight concrete mix that is a little easier to handle and uses up a byproduct of our building process.

Jeff commented on how mesmerizing it was to watch the concrete spin in the mixer.

You can just make out the white bits of foam in the mix.  To make the pellets of styrofoam, I boxed in an area with the blocks large enough to hold an electric lawn mower.

I then covered the bin with a cloth and ran the lawnmower which produced a pile of little pellets. After sifting them through hardware cloth into a stock tank,  we ended up with the fourth ingredient for our lightweight concrete. Or is it a big barrel of cottage cheese?

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