BLOCKS AS A PRIMARY BUILDING MATERIAL COMPARED TO BRICKS.

Author: Anita Amoah Marry

Amount of Blocks or Bricks Needed – The block sizes used are mainly the 6-inches for construction at the foundation level and the 5-inches for the building itself, while the brick; on the other hand; being smaller in size, a number of 6 pieces would be needed to make 1 single block. This sums up to the fact that more bricks would be required than blocks in building. Taking for instance, a case of building a standard 14 by 14 feet single room in Ghana; approximately, a number of 150 bags of cement, which is equivalent to 4,500 good quality blocks are needed as against a total of 27,000 bricks for the same kind of building. Moreover, one must also not forget that an amount of sand would be needed to be mixed with the cement in producing the blocks.

Cost of Fuel/Cement – Most people believe that it may be expensive putting up a brick building because of the initial cost to be incurred as compared with the block building.

In the case of brick, more fuel is needed for the entire production, which involves mixing, drying, firing and fabrication, including hand molding.

 Consequently, more fuel would be needed for this kind of work, and this calls for more money, having its own repercussions on the pocket of the builder with respect to the rampant increase of fuel prices in Ghana lately.

The block on the other hand, does not require much more input to be produced as in the case of the bricks. It involves molding and drying. The challenge with producing blocks has got to do with the unstable prices of cement, which shot up to Ghs 102.00 now.

Labour Intensity – It is obvious that the labour force in brick building is greater than the labour force needed in block building. More workers would be needed in the brick case to undertake the various production processes of mixing, drying, firing and moulding; whereas only a few of the workers would be needed in the block building. For instance, if 8 workers are needed in the brick production, with 2 of them taking up one of the production processes, equally, only 2 workers will be needed in the block production – one worker for the mixing and moulding, and the other for the drying. More workers simply mean more cash to pay them.

 

Building Process – Obviously, the building process involved in both block and brick would be different, with the other requiring more people on board and using more time than the other. Bricks for instance, require more skills right from the production to the building, not to mention that they are smaller in size and also heavier, making it more difficult to be installed by few workers. This can cause a prolonged time of completion, meanwhile prices of goods and services would be going up. For the block, only a few people can handle the entire building process.

 The machines used in bricks production is undoubtedly more expensive than the machine used in producing blocks. Therefore, it is easy to raise money in acquiring a block-producing machine than that of the brick-producing.

 

The high cost involved here has accounted for the non-usage of the bricks and scarcity of brick buildings in Ghana; however, the maintenance costs are as low. The bricks building do not need plastering and painting as would be needed in the block building. Also, when building in a water-logged area or on a wet land, bricks are the best choice the reason being that they are stronger and can absorb the water without collapsing, unlike the block building.

Despite these conveniences and advantages, cement block remains builders’ first choice.

 

 

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